The Big Picture: You Are Wrong About Sucker Punch, Part One

Mikkaddo

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Jan 19, 2008
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to put in my (admittedly pointless, yelling at the internet and all) two cents:

I saw the movie because babydoll and her friends, yes are hot, but also because every trailer I saw made my brain say one thing and one thing only. "This shit looks like a 2 hour heavy metal music video" and I was more or less right. True, the music isn't the point the point is the anti-misogyny message and the clever "HA HA WE ARE MOCKING YOU" hook(hence the name as Bob says)but it was still essentially a 2 hour music video to my eyes.

As far as it sucking or not, I thought the action scenes were confusing and cloudy as fuck. I mean the whole WWII scene looks at first like it's going to be something about fantasy, then actual WWII styles, then it's steampunk then there's zombies and then babydoll has fucking superpowers and the fortitude of the cheerleader from heroes . . . I mean really, that didn't flow quite right to me. And then in the middle of all that there's a giant bunny mech too out of no where like a Gundam in feudal Japan (Burst Angel did that actually . . .) However, as far as the rest of it, I thought it worked rather well . . . the transitions between weird action scenes and "actually it was what's in her head while she dances" were jarring but they were meant to be. Mirroring the shock of the disgusting men realizing the dance is over, so really that worked out too.

However, I REALLY think it shines outside of the action scenes, even if you ignore the lacking dialogue and the apparent psychic powers of sweetpea and the brothel owner (I'll still never understand how he realized items no one noticed missing went missing) the brothel and the characters all fit the world you're meant to see perfectly. The asylum/brothel is filthy, grimy, old and broken metal is rusted none of the furniture matches the other furniture. The girls wear ballet leotards that don't match and are faded and stained, the only time they wear anything clean or "pretty" is when it's to call in the customers as a sort of lure by tarting up the girls. It really sells the sexual abuse perfectly without a single word. You see the place, see the almost visible layer of grime over everything that's outside what customers would see and you just KNOW they treat the girls just as badly. That is something that's often overlooked with movies I think.

No one noticed the near perfect visual style of Saw, making the bathroom look horrific and filthy and the metal door seeming impenetrable and all, but they sure as hell noticed Gordon and John Kramer and all the actors. They seemed to ignore the uncomfortable grit on the pipes and all that was around them, the dirty grimey look of the bow saws they have, but they noticed that gordon's wife was a shit actress.

The same can be said with a lot of other movies, a movie isn't acting and story alone, it's like with videogames. It's a whole package, there's a lot more to any movie than what's being said and how well the actors say it.
 

Sutter Cane

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Jun 27, 2010
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Casual Shinji said:
Sucker Punch wanted to have it's cake and eat it, and then through it up all over the audience.

Everybody got this movie, I don't see how anyone couldn't, however some people liked what they got and others fucking hated it.

I have no problem with anyone liking this film, but saying people didn't like it because they didn't "get it", makes my skin crawl.

Plus, it's just a fucking terrible looking movie, with horrendously fake CGI, wooden acting performances, bastardized versions of classic songs, shitty fight scenes that go on forever (that train sequence, Jesus Christ), Bjork, a villain with no motivation other than "women, argh", and oversaturized colours.
The Human Torch said:
I saw Suckerpunch several times after I bought it on Blu-Ray (it went out of movietheatres very quickly in my country, so I missed it there), and I really enjoyed it.

I got the fantasy within the fantasy, but not for one moment did any thought of feminism, opressed and stereotypical females and audience mocking come to my moment. My girlfriend watched this movie with me, she missed the message as well.

For a movie that is supposed to carry over this message, it really sucks at doing so. And perhaps that is it's major flaw.
DugMachine said:
I honestly didn't 'get it' when I first watched it but enjoyed the film for what it was, an interesting little action movie with hot girls fighting robot ninjas. After watching your review and break downs of the message I appreciate it way more than I originally did. Granted, the movie itself isn't that great and could have been done much better but I definitely see what it was trying to say now.

Great video Bob, can't wait for next week.
So everyone got this movie then casual shinji? You so sure about that, because it seems to me that you are incorrect on that assumption
 

Stabby Joe

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Jul 30, 2008
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I went to go see this film due to some unconventional looking action sequences which despite the general snobbery of certain film fans IS still a good reason to go to the cinema. The skimpy outfits was never a factor nor was I aroused at any point given the sexual abuse being a recurring theme throughout. So basically I'm not sure if I got "hit" or was even the target of the film by Bob's theory.
 

MovieBob

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Dec 31, 2008
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Bob sucks as a critique because he liked RedTails, not because he liked Sucker Punch.
 

sinsfire

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Nov 17, 2009
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Storm Dragon said:
I liked this movie overall, but my biggest problem with it was the ending.
Babydoll stays behind so her friend can escape, and that's fine; heroic sacrifices and all. But then she ends up getting lobotomized and presumably spends the rest of her life as a vegetable. That's horrible! I would have been okay with it if she had simply been killed, but this... This is a fate worse than death. I'm not really criticizing the movie on a storytelling level for this ending, but I just can't stand it when a story ends this way. I feel the same way about George Orwell's 1984,
where the protagonist and his girlfriend are brainwashed and indoctrinated into the system.
I thought the book was good, but I hated how it ended.
Not everything ends happily. The ending to 1984 was perfect for the themes it was attempting to convey. I would recommend against reading "A Brave New World" (book) but you may like Terry Gilliams "Brazil" (moive)

As for the ending in Sucker Punch I think there may be more to it then that.
the heroic scarifice is not just for the friend who gets away, but in doing so the practice of unauthorized labotomy is discovered and presumably the director is removed from his position. Therefore her sacrifice is for all those that remain as well. I anticipate Bob may discuss this a bit next week as well. Side note, great cameo by John Hamm.
 

ace_of_something

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Sep 19, 2008
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Well, I liked it, didn't LOVE it (my wife and her friends sure did though), I definitely didn't read all the satire from it though. I just thought it was fun. Also, perhaps it's because I'm in my 30's and repressed but I found none of the fetishistic outfits to be all that attractive.
 

Falseprophet

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Jan 13, 2009
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jaymiechan said:
Then there is the point that the film, regardless of whatever lofty goals it might have had, revels in the very thing it is attempting to satirize. i mean, for cripes sake, you don't even find out any of the names of the women! AKA a very humanizing element, and something that could have cemented, even if held as a reveal for the end.
AKA the Truffaut Was Right [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DoNotDoThisCoolThing?from=Main.TruffautWasRight] trope. I didn't despise this movie, but I felt that way too. I just got the sense it was "female empowerment through the lens of early 90s Image Comics". Also, the ending kind of torpedoes the whole thing:
Babydoll saves one of the other girls from imprisonment--by sacrificing all her agency, intellect, and individuality, which leaves her with this beatific smile of enlightenment. Male martyrs almost always die while in command of their actions, beliefs and self. But finally give us a female martyr, and she becomes a mindless living doll, bereft of personality.
Ugh.
 

Casual Shinji

Should've gone before we left.
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Jul 18, 2009
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Sutter Cane said:
Casual Shinji said:
Sucker Punch wanted to have it's cake and eat it, and then through it up all over the audience.

Everybody got this movie, I don't see how anyone couldn't, however some people liked what they got and others fucking hated it.

I have no problem with anyone liking this film, but saying people didn't like it because they didn't "get it", makes my skin crawl.

Plus, it's just a fucking terrible looking movie, with horrendously fake CGI, wooden acting performances, bastardized versions of classic songs, shitty fight scenes that go on forever (that train sequence, Jesus Christ), Bjork, a villain with no motivation other than "women, argh", and oversaturized colours.
So everyone got this movie then casual shinji? You so sure about that, because it seems to me that you are incorrect on that assumption
It flat out tells you what it is about at the end. "So, fight!"

Anyone not getting it by this point must've fallen asleep because of how epically boring the whole movie was.
 

The Human Torch

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Sep 12, 2010
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Sutter Cane said:
Casual Shinji said:
Sucker Punch wanted to have it's cake and eat it, and then through it up all over the audience.

Everybody got this movie, I don't see how anyone couldn't, however some people liked what they got and others fucking hated it.

I have no problem with anyone liking this film, but saying people didn't like it because they didn't "get it", makes my skin crawl.

Plus, it's just a fucking terrible looking movie, with horrendously fake CGI, wooden acting performances, bastardized versions of classic songs, shitty fight scenes that go on forever (that train sequence, Jesus Christ), Bjork, a villain with no motivation other than "women, argh", and oversaturized colours.
The Human Torch said:
I saw Suckerpunch several times after I bought it on Blu-Ray (it went out of movietheatres very quickly in my country, so I missed it there), and I really enjoyed it.

I got the fantasy within the fantasy, but not for one moment did any thought of feminism, opressed and stereotypical females and audience mocking come to my moment. My girlfriend watched this movie with me, she missed the message as well.

For a movie that is supposed to carry over this message, it really sucks at doing so. And perhaps that is it's major flaw.
DugMachine said:
I honestly didn't 'get it' when I first watched it but enjoyed the film for what it was, an interesting little action movie with hot girls fighting robot ninjas. After watching your review and break downs of the message I appreciate it way more than I originally did. Granted, the movie itself isn't that great and could have been done much better but I definitely see what it was trying to say now.

Great video Bob, can't wait for next week.
So everyone got this movie then casual shinji? You so sure about that, because it seems to me that you are incorrect on that assumption
Hey, in my defense: I actually understood that the brothel was Babydoll's way of coping with a fantasy world and the action sequences were fantasies within that fantasy world. That's more than most of my friends got out of it. :p
 

CosmicCommander

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Apr 11, 2009
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Oh, great. It's just misandrist! It's good to know that this is a very forward-thinking film that doesn't insult or stereotype a group of people (that the filmmakers won't get pulled over by the culture police for).
 

wetfart

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Jul 11, 2010
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So ... yea. I completely missed that point of the movie. My wife and I rented it, turned off our brains and completely LOVED the film.

If ignorance is bliss, then I'm the happiest guy in the world. :)
 

Sir Shockwave

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Jul 4, 2011
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Markunator said:
I'm sorry, Bob, but I still won't watch this film. These guys' views on movies tend to mean more to me than yours (no offense):
While we're bringing up counter arguments, here - allow me to bring up this amateur internet review. [http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/teamt/fbv/bmbe/34445-bad-movie-beatdown-sucker-punch]

He may not be on the same level, but some valid criticism of the movie is made. Oh, and this is also a Crossover Review - with a female reviewer.
 

Robot Number V

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May 15, 2012
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See, that's really clever and all, but I've always been of the opinion that if a story wants to be a metaphor and a story at the same time, then in has to accomplish BOTH successfully. It doesn't matter how great the metaphor is if the story suffers for it, or vice versa. And the story REALLY suffered for this (admittedly very good) metaphor.
 

WanderingFool

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MovieBob said:
You Are Wrong About Sucker Punch, Part One

MovieBob delivers a Sucker Punch to your senses.

Watch Video
So... be use of Troll logic[footnote]By sayinjg this, im hoping people will get that im not being serious.[/footnote], am a better person than all those who went to see the movie and enjoyed it... by virtue of the fact nothing about the movie interested me...

Still an interesting video.
 

AxelxGabriel

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Nov 13, 2009
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Seriously dude? You went to all this trouble to make not one, but two videos just to say how better you are then all of us just because we dont like a movie you do?

Fuck you Bob and your pretentiousness.
 

Hoplon

Jabbering Fool
Mar 31, 2010
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MovieBob said:
You Are Wrong About Sucker Punch, Part One

MovieBob delivers a Sucker Punch to your senses.

Watch Video
While I don't think you're wrong, as you point out, it constantly fails to really communicate these themes successfully.

That's why it's a bad film. knowing what he was trying to do doesn't really improve it in the slightest.
 

teebeeohh

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Jun 17, 2009
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so you are saying zack snyder basically pulled a superboy prime? interesting.
i was kinda indifferent towards the movie, it just didn't really work for me but i didn't hate it like everyone else seemed to.
the main reason why i watched it is because it has a giant samurai armor representing a nightmare and every that has that is awesome.

edit: what never works for me in any movie is trying to parody something by doing the exact same thing and putting a "LOL ironic" or "BUT YOU ENJOY THIS TROPE YOU EVIL FUCK" behind it. the only reason it worked so well in starship troopers is because of the prisoner scene towards the end.