Escape to the Movies: Sucker Punch

[mchoueiri]

This movie looks like nothing but a CGI filled action film.

 

[qazmatoz]

I got chills from this review. Like most, I was prepared to pass this off as nerd pandering, just as much as 300 was douche pandering, but now I must see this. Thanks, Bob.

 

[qbanknight]

Yes this excactly.

It's sad when a critic will tell the audience to go see this movie, as if it was command. THe movie like all other style over substance flicks will make a killing in the box office regardless. There are smaller more overlooked works of cinema that he could be instead directing us to.

It's not wrong to recommend others to a mainstream film. But when he HIMSELF admits that a movie will be polarizing and divisive, he should caution his recommendation with maybe: "If you REALLY loved Snyder's work, then you'll LOVE this" or "If you're not into Snyder's work, maybe you should catch it as a matinée or rental".

 

[shogunblade]

I am still on board for this movie, but I have to ask: Moviebob said that drawing comparisons to "Brazil" wouldn't be an accident. I just have to ask, is Sucker Punch only in vague comparison to Brazil because of the dreamscape ideal or because the movie is a random mishmash of various vignettes strung together to resemble a movie?

I.E - This isn't Brazil with Guns, is it?

I didn't really care for that movie, and if S.P is simply Brazil with a sex change, nazis, dragons and guns, I might be more inclined to miss it. Sorry for offending anybody who loves that movie, but it was not my cup of tea. The Dream parts were, but everything else, not so much.

 

[Madara XIII]

Urgh...I feel like I just lost the raging debate I've been having with my friends over whether or not this was a male fetish movie.

Same....*sigh* I'm still going to wait to see it on DVD. Sorry, but the whole Scantily clad women thing turned me off despite how much action there is.
IDC what Bob's view on that is, but I could stand for some Heroic Gender Diversity for the love of F*ck all!! Honestly at first glance (and not inspection) this seems like a female empowerment movie and if I wanted to see something Burlesque then I'll go see "Burlesque" (great movie by the way). It's just that I feel a bit misled with this movie. I'm torn between the hardcore action and revealing outfits. I just can't do it.

So put me on team NO.

Have at me whoever wants to, but I am not changing my stance on this movie.

 

[Darth Sea Bass]

Seeing it next week in imax when it's released in the uk! Can't freaking wait!

 

[ahpuch]

I was gonna see this as Zack Snyder has already earned my next 10 bucks after 300 and watchmen. Knowing it might be better than the 28% on rotten tomatoes is encouraging.

As to the WonderWoman shot, the problem isn't the costume so much as that it looks she couldn't fight her way out of a wet paper bag.

 

[BehattedWanderer]

I cannot wait to see this. I am frothing a little here.

 

[Madara XIII]

No Bob, this is not an example of a young director expressing his artistic talent in a positive way. This film is to Snyder as "Lady in the Water" was to M. Night. It's Snyder's own personal world that only makes sense to him and him alone.

The script is utterly insipid. The first 15 minutes have no dialogue and all we are treated to is a remix version of 80s songs that dealt with dreams. Now "Up" had a beginning that had no dialogue and was so emotionally resounding that it was amazing to see people NOT cry in the beginning. But nothing interesting is going on here, just Snyder's "unique" artistic style. And by "unique", I mean slowing down and speeding up every goddamn frame to make mundane activities seem interesting: close up on a key, stop, quick cut to face slow-mo, quick cut to lock speed up, etc. It's absolutely pointless and it's nothing interesting.

The characters are bland and uninteresting. I cannot fathom how you saw ANY character in these girls. These girls were just archetypes: the shy but free-spirit, the hard-knock life chick, the flirt, the screw up, and the...I don't know what to call Vanessa Hudgens since she has less than 15 lines in the whole damn movie. Joe Hamm is totally wasted, he is constantly demonized as the "High Roller" throughout the movie but he doesn't say a word of dialogue until the last 5 minutes in the movie. The "Wise Man" giving the girls instructions says so many off-the-wall-completely-unrelated quips (like "if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything") that my audience was laughing in the screening we got. They would make a fortune cookie say, "what the hell are you talking about?!"

This is style over substance and yes, pandering, Bob. You are claiming critics are dismissing it as such. And they are totally right, because there is nothing empowering about these girls fighting when we are treated to so many crotch shots of their panties when they fight.

People, rent this movie. Don't bother catching this theaters. That way, you can at least fast forward to the cool sequences and stop it all when the last dream is done.

Now I'm looking to Superman with a sad, sad face.

THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!! Someone sees this movie is definitely pandering for the sex appeal and is what turned me away from this movie. Now as Character development goes, I can take your word for it considering I know my archetypes. The least they could have done would be to make them less scantily clad in their dream world considering in reality they have to dress as such in a brothel and dressing appropriately for said situation might be a dream come true for some. That's just speculation mind you, but you sir, you are an inspiration.

Thank you kindly.

 

[bmart008]

I'm interested to see this movie, but the fact that 70% of critics didn't like it I'm torn. Maybe I'll check it out on cheap tuesdays.

 

[LavaLampBamboo]

I must have missed all that depth and fleshed out character bit. It's a film where girls fight through crazy dream scapes, but I have no idea why they are fighting through crazy dreamscapes. Why are they in Steampunk WW1? I dunno, but they are.

The characters aren't all female. There's nothing empowering about scantily clad girls fighting samurai. Sure it looks awesome and the fights are well done, but I wasn't thinking "Oh, I have much more respect for her now."

Sucker Punch doesn't even seem to try to go any deeper than "GIRLS! FIGHTING! EXPLOSIONS!"

 

[A random person]

Hm, I did like Watchmen and thought the concept and design was interesting. I might see this tonight if I can get some friends together.

 

[Nenad]

SON OF A *****!!!

I was going to see this movie tonight. We had everything planned. Then what happens? My friend sees its score on metacritic and "won't pay for a shitty movie" so now we're seeing Paul...


I WANT TO SEE THIS FUCKING MOVIE!!!!!!!

Hopefully I can persuade him otherwise...

Just show him this review...

 

[Plurralbles]

I'll have to see it. Can't be bad. Though I wish it wasn't so spit in face.

 

[AceAngel]

Thank you Bob for finally making a decent review. It's been a long while, and your Paul review was pretty weak, and had troll baiting in it with Battle for LA, but this one? You gave a compelling enough review for me to go and see it.

Please, keep this up.

 

[Shameless]

Sorry Bob, even if you told me that it deserves watching, I won't pay money for this kind of movies, Zack Snyder has only directed 1 good movie, that Legend of the Guardians, the other are just lackluster and didn't appeal to me.

This one actually looks way too silly, and if you enjoyed or others enjoyed it, fine, more power to you, but to me, Zack Snyder is a director that never really knows how to tell a story, in a movie, story comes first then visuals second, if the visuals are good and the story is bad then is' a bad movie.

 

[DTWolfwood]

thanks for reminding me its out today! gonna go see it after work.

And yes long pants don't work on Wonder Woman

 

[castlewise]

I think Bob and I have different taste....

 

[Pointer]

It's interesting how hollywood has been exploring dreams as of late... or concepts of reality. I wonder if that says anything about the current climate with the recession and all. Perhaps we all wish we could escape into our heads?


Anyway, sweet review. I will be seeing this

Its also a play upon the current generation. We've all grown up with a weird sense of reality. From video games providing other planes of existence to wars we can't really feel but can only see, we question our reality constantly.

And there is also the desire to escape shitty economic conditions as well no doubt.

Speaking on the movie I think its going to be all that Mr. Bob claims and more. I'm hopefully going to see it with one of my bros this weekend. But he won't be going for the reasons I am. He just wants to see chicks in short skirts kill shit up.