Sucker Punch (2011)

 

This one is a little weird. Maybe it's because this is Zack Synder at his most 'Zack-Snyder-y'. 

You'll see what I mean in a couple of minutes.

The story (well, sort of) starts when the mother of two young girls dies and the abusive stepfather discovers that all money is bequeathed to the girls. He kills the youngest and the eldest attacks him, yet can't kill him outright. So he has her institutionalized in a mental facility and paid an orderly so she can get a lobotomy in five days, thus ensuring that he gets all the money. 

Yes, it's a very uplifting start, isn't it?

The girl (she is referred to as 'Babydoll') fantasizes that she and some other girls are trapped in a dubious nightclub and she can transport herself and onlookers to a different realm when she dances, because she apparently can dance in a very mezmerising way. You will never see her dance though. I guess that's because you can't really get that effect when someone is gyrating in various ways. 

Through her dancing, she envisions several quests and adventures with some of the other girls in order to obtain a couple of items they need in order to escape. But things don't go according to plan and in the end, only Sweet Pea (one of the other girls) manages to make it out.

Yes, massive spoiler, but if you couldn't see how this was going to play out from the start, you have clearly not been paying any attention whatsoever.

This is a weird sort of film. There isn't a lot of story, and this constant switching between the real world, the make-belief world and then the fantasy quests is a little jarring at times. The colourschemes are also fairly bland. Snyder just uses very drab hues of brown, blue and greyish green and it doesn't really make this film very appealing to look at. You will also see a lot of slow motion, even more than in '300', but where it was sufficiently fitting for that comic book adaptation, here, it is so overused that it becomes annoying at times. 

The acting can be rather uneven. Oscar Isaac and Carla Gugino do ham it up quite a lot. Especially Gugino, who apparently is now a Russian doctor/dance tutor, but her accent is so all over the place it is hilarious. Most of the girls can't really act convincingly either, I'm afraid to say. Abbie Cornish as Sweet Pea is always angry and Emily Browning as Babydoll is a little too coy and silent most of the time. And she is supposed to be the one we are rooting for. What is also rather confusing, is the role the girls play. On the one hand, they are portrayed as badasses in the fantasy sequences and it is fun to see them kick ass, but you can't escape the fact that they are always dressed in what can only be described as 'primo fetish outfits'. I am not even joking. Sure, they are fun to look at because they are lovely ladies, but it does leave you with a bit of a bizarre feeling that this might just be a little too objectifying. 

Teenage boys will love this, though. 

But in all fairness, the action scenes are the best parts of this film. They fly by and can be fun to watch, if at times a touch too shaky and hard to follow. And it is a lot of fun seeing a couple of girls kick so much ass. 

You know what's also pretty darn good? The soundtrack. 

In the end though, this is a very mixed bag and not exactly a great film to watch. You won't care too much about the characters and in a film about abuse that is a pretty big letdown. You're supposed to feel sympathy for the main characters and would want them to escape, but more than a "Meh." won't escape your lips. I guess with that much focus on slow motion and eyecandy, there wasn't much room for anything else. Try at your own risk.