Do not see this movie unless you are very VERY VERY high!!
Which is likely the state that Director turned writer and story man Zack Snyder and his co-writer Steve Shibuya were in during the writing and production of this movie. Seriously, and not in a good way.
Suckerpunch is the latest offering from director Zack Snyder. Previous efforts from Snyder include the film adaptations of the graphic novels "300" and "Watchmen", and the remake of "Dawn of the Dead". This is the first outing for him as both story creator AND writer (with Steve Shibuya) AND director.
Suckerpunch is the story of a young woman (Baby Doll) wrongly imprisoned in a mental institution by her evil stepfather. This occurs after the death of her young sister during Baby Doll's attempt to save said sister from rape/beating/murder (take your pick) by said evil stepfather. Naturally, the stepfather pays a corrupt orderly (who is apparently sexually abusing and perhaps prostituting the female inmates) to ensure that the girl will be lobotomized to further ensure that Stepfather will control her inheritance from her mother, and that she will be forever unable to testify against him. Baby Doll retreats from the exploitation environment of her Stepfather and the Asylum, to a fantasy world where she plans her escape from the institution.
Baby Doll's chosen fantasy land? A forced prostitution club where her almost supernatural (and mercifully never seen) ability to dance mesmerizes bad guys and transports her to secondary fantasies wherein she and several of her fellow prisoners don Katana's, heavy artillery and really cool but completely impractical corset and boots combos, to do everything from slaying dragons and orcs to slaying clockwork Nazi's. In each "mission" they gather certain items (from the mesmerized bad guys in fantasy world 1) which have been laid out for them by yoda..er Scott Glenn (perpetually spouting nonsense, cliche quotations) as necessary for their escape.
Of course, trials and tribulations ensue...and eventually an escape or two...kind of..
I had not read any reviews of the movie prior to viewing. I had barely seen a trailer in fact, so I was expecting a girl-power, anime inspired action flick. And I think that might have been what the creators were after. The first ten minutes, which were a brilliant piece of wordless, set to music, BEAUTIFUL story set up, gave me hope for a realization of the expectations and perhaps a bit more. Unfortunately they failed miserably. The entire movie was a sequence of very pretty but utterly nonsensical and completely unrelated fantasy action scenes, interspersed with positively painful sequences of "plot".
The intro leads one to expect an adventure of feminine self-empowerment with the added bennies of big guns and cool warrior-chick togs. One of my fellow sufferers informs me (she read reviews before hand) that it was in fact the intent of the creators to produce an exploitation style film that was not exploitation but empowerment instead. Again. Epic fail. There is, a pervasive miasma of misogyny throughout the movie and all of its settings. It is not quite 100% exploitation, but is close enough to be a turn-on for those who seek that kind of porn. However, since it is PG-13 there is no actual sex, so I suppose it fails in that vein as well. The overall message is that the best women can hope for is either learning how to live with exploitation, enslavement and violation, or a lobotomy to make one forget it.
We all came away rather confused and not at all sure what we thought. We did however agree that there were two features of the movie that were complete wins. Double thumbs up all the way around. The first is the sound-track, which is a wonderful collection of classic rock songs done up as thoroughly modernized covers. REALLY good! The other plus? Well, that is more subjective but we were all in agreement. REALLY awesome shoes! OK yes, girly perhaps. But then, it was a Girl's Night Out activity.
Final remarks. Snyder should stick strictly to adapting the work of others to the screen. He has amazing vision for, well, visuals. He should also stay away from the hallucinogenics, and finally, if he is straight, he should definitely get out and date more. He has NO idea what makes women tick. He does, however have great taste in soundtracks and shoes...hey wait a minute!...hmmmm.....OK I have to stop now before I get too much farther down that Freudian rabbit-hole.
Of course, trials and tribulations ensue...and eventually an escape or two...kind of..
I had not read any reviews of the movie prior to viewing. I had barely seen a trailer in fact, so I was expecting a girl-power, anime inspired action flick. And I think that might have been what the creators were after. The first ten minutes, which were a brilliant piece of wordless, set to music, BEAUTIFUL story set up, gave me hope for a realization of the expectations and perhaps a bit more. Unfortunately they failed miserably. The entire movie was a sequence of very pretty but utterly nonsensical and completely unrelated fantasy action scenes, interspersed with positively painful sequences of "plot".
The intro leads one to expect an adventure of feminine self-empowerment with the added bennies of big guns and cool warrior-chick togs. One of my fellow sufferers informs me (she read reviews before hand) that it was in fact the intent of the creators to produce an exploitation style film that was not exploitation but empowerment instead. Again. Epic fail. There is, a pervasive miasma of misogyny throughout the movie and all of its settings. It is not quite 100% exploitation, but is close enough to be a turn-on for those who seek that kind of porn. However, since it is PG-13 there is no actual sex, so I suppose it fails in that vein as well. The overall message is that the best women can hope for is either learning how to live with exploitation, enslavement and violation, or a lobotomy to make one forget it.
We all came away rather confused and not at all sure what we thought. We did however agree that there were two features of the movie that were complete wins. Double thumbs up all the way around. The first is the sound-track, which is a wonderful collection of classic rock songs done up as thoroughly modernized covers. REALLY good! The other plus? Well, that is more subjective but we were all in agreement. REALLY awesome shoes! OK yes, girly perhaps. But then, it was a Girl's Night Out activity.
Final remarks. Snyder should stick strictly to adapting the work of others to the screen. He has amazing vision for, well, visuals. He should also stay away from the hallucinogenics, and finally, if he is straight, he should definitely get out and date more. He has NO idea what makes women tick. He does, however have great taste in soundtracks and shoes...hey wait a minute!...hmmmm.....OK I have to stop now before I get too much farther down that Freudian rabbit-hole.
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