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

BrionJames

New member
Jul 8, 2009
540
0
0
They didn't get my money. I tend to stay out of debates about sexism on the grounds that neither side really knows a GOOD answer to whatever issue they're posing as a problem. Heterosexual men like seeing beautiful women in skimpy outfits, the female form is attractive. I don't see why people are surprised by this, nor do I think it grounds to shake your fist at the male sex. Now if the movie is as heavy handed as Bob says it to be, then I really have no interest because I'm not a guy that gets off on the girl in a tiny school uniform with a katana fighting things. Things like Dead or Alive Volleyball and Lolipop Chainsaw don't appeal to me because I recognize it for what it is - schlock. Just like the Resident Evil movies, stupid shit glazed over with guns,swords, and tits because executives think it will sell. AND because most men are drooling neanderthals this shit goes on and on forever, just look back at the late 60's with Barbarella, I'm sure it goes back farther but this has been going on since movies have been a thing. So, I say to hell with Sucker Punch and anyone who thought it was a good movie.
 

Escapefromwhatever

New member
Feb 21, 2009
2,368
0
0
Though the movie is meant to be a condemnation of fetishistic, pandering male nerd fantasies, it still sells itself as one. People go to see it for that aspect of it. It's sort of like Dr. Faustus- yeah, it condemns Faustus for making a deal with the devil, but that's not where the fun lies. The fun lies in seeing Faustus fuck around with his demon buddy. That's the real reason the play exists. So one must wonder if the aforementioned condemnation is really sincere, since the whole point of the film seems to be displaying loosely tied vignettes of beta male wish fulfillment, with the irony being more of an excuse for it than an actual reason for the movie to exist. Yeah, Sucker Punch, you're doing it ironically, but you're still doing it.
 

demonsbanenathan

New member
May 5, 2011
11
0
0
.. How can anyone claim Sucker Punch is bad film when people debate it so vociferously?

I come at it from the perspective of it as art - it's incited and encouraged debate, investigation and emotional responses. To me, therefore, it's good.
 

Lovely Mixture

New member
Jul 12, 2011
1,474
0
0
demonsbanenathan said:
.. How can anyone claim Sucker Punch is bad film when people debate it so vociferously?
Cause people have different definitions of good and bad, and what is artistic.


demonsbanenathan said:
I come at it from the perspective of it as art - it's incited and encouraged debate, investigation and emotional responses. To me, therefore, it's good.
Well literary criticism encourages debate about anything. I still see what you're saying though.
 

planet.tyler

New member
Mar 1, 2012
24
0
0
Thank you bob I couldn't agree more; cheers as well for pointing out the same issue in brief with ppl not getting the tone of starship troopers, I've been saying it for years dammit!
 

Sixcess

New member
Feb 27, 2010
2,719
0
0
If a film's message or meaning is so poorly delivered that I have to watch a commentary or read an analytical essay to understand what the filmmakers were trying to say... then it's a bad film. End of story.
 

Diane Miller

New member
Jul 2, 2011
12
0
0
MacNille said:
As I'm one of the people who saw the movie,It is full of shit.I still loath this fucking movie. Awful script. Boring action piece and insulting its audience for getting what they wanted. Sucker Punch is the worst kind of movie: A movie that think it is so cleaver. When it is not. Everything about it is pointless! That we hear how "good" of a dancer Baby doll is when we don't see it a fatal mistake. It is called SHOW don't tell. I don't give two fucks how good of a dancer she is, if I don't see it.
I think you're missing the point. The whole "dancing" thing is taking place in her head. It isn't real. It's the kind of plot device that a bad author - the author in this case being Babydoll - uses when she doesn't have the imagination necessary to create it for real. They don't show it to you because Babydoll can't do it. Remember, she's locked up in an asylum. For most movies, your criticism would be completely valid. It just isn't for this one.

Now, I'm not claiming that the movie is a great one. I went to it unwillingly, found that I enjoyed it in the theater, and haven't bothered to watch it again. (I may change that after next week's episode. We'll see.) It has it's faults, but I think Bob's point is a valid one. For all of it's flaws, I think a great deal of the criticism directed at this movie is pointing the wrong direction.

Oh, and by the way, Bob - if you ever read this. You don't suck as a critic. I find I agree with you about 60% of the time, which is far more than any other film critic I can think of.
 

Pebkio

The Purple Mage
Nov 9, 2009
780
0
0
I got it but couldn't decide if I liked it or not, and couldn't even tell why I didn't like it; couldn't. Now I do, thanks Bob:

I watched Pan's Labyrinth for the first time just a month before I watched this movie. Pan's Labyrinth handled the premise (young girl escapes into fantasy to escape horrible life) much much better. But there was still the premise, and I like that premise. Premisepremisepremisepremisepremisepremise.

Anyway, I didn't even notice the target audience thing... but my brain must've. I hate movies, and the directors who film them, that are targeted to insult (or otherwise malign) the audience for which they're designed.

...as well as movies, books, magazines, TV Shows, bathroom stall scribblings, and food (I'm looking at you Baby Ruth).

So yeah, I don't like Sucker Punch: because it's a bullshit waste of time aimed at people they don't like to make a point that is designed to make people dislike the people who wasted time to make a point aimed at people they didn't like in the first place! They are actively wasting time in order to keep our wasteful fighting active. How much more cyclical to I have to keep being?

They need their teeth kicked in...
 

Darmani

New member
Apr 26, 2010
231
0
0
OtherSideofSky said:
Sucker Punch was boring. The frenetic action scenes were repetitive drivel which tried to use CGI and quick editing tricks to mask subpar choreography and uninspired framing. I don't care whether or not they were supposed to be repetitive drivel: I was still bored as fuck watching them. The excellent (and decidedly not fun) Chinese film Mr. Zhao contains a ten minute take of two people sitting on a badly lit sofa and having the same conversation over and over again, and that was still more interesting than anything in Sucker Punch.

As for the message? It's bullshit. Insulting, offensive bullshit. Are any of these movies feminist? Who cares? If Robin Morgan, Jessica Valenti, Andrea Dworkin, Catherine Breillat, Mary Wollstonecraft, Ozy Frantz, Noah Brand and Clarisse Thorn are all feminists (and that's only a very limited selection), I'm not sure how meaningful that adjective can actually be. The message Sucker Punch is pushing is the idea that having a sexual fantasy (specifically, a man having a sexual fantasy about a woman) is not only inherently wrong and harmful, but defines the person having it and their relations with others. It goes on to equate those fantasies (and here I would like to point out that the film specifically takes aim fantasies of men considered socially undesirable and thus already easy targets) with real acts of institutionalized abuse and violence. This is a blatant false equivalency and it plays to the romantic fantasies of the eternal female victim at the mercy of a cruel, brutish world that are far more insidiously patriarchal in their own right than any of the layered delusions. As a real life victim of institutionalized abuse committed by (mostly female) social workers on account of my mental condition, I was deeply offended by Sucker Punch and the shallow pandering drivel it attempts to pass off as a deconstruction. To be brutally honest, the film feels like an outdated separatist piece from thirty years ago more than anything else.
I just wanted to quote this for lots of WORD. Furthermore if the suckerpunch is to lure us with fantasies and then subvert us with the reality or negative implications the brothel really does not help. It undermines Gorsky who I just want to take time to praise. In most asylum drama's the doctors wouldn't know communication if it shot them. Gorsky has security staff out of the way but allows for self expression and etc and even despite babydoll's in reality actions (what we don't get to see and note this involves the excusing/unelaboration of the DRAMATIC DEATHS) wishes to calm and reach her.
I particularly felt what worked against the movie was just how...quickly the fantasies lost context. The first made more or less sense. Babydoll is in a stark harsh landscape seeks shelter and then a plan this enables her the fight and reach for talent and such that she doesn't know she has. By the second.. they are all despite all of one scene of reluctant apprehensive agreement in the fantasy as a crackshot team. Effectively we spend all this time in "her" head and yet it is full of nothing but hostile sexual abuse or nerdy male fantasies broken up by the occasional women in prison drama. And the worse is that it starts kinda smart but descends into crash dramatic depth that's just as cheap as the action fantasies.
One thing in my brain for a while has been a VGcat'ish parody with the movie constantly berating the viewer for liking women in sexy outfits in high action romps with the last panel being a tearstruck female. I know its less likely but what about the girls who ya know wanted a sexy action flick and got the abuse-a0-thon.

As one person said when the movie was fresh if this was a movie about a girl using imagination to contextualize and fight the shitty in average girl life (and NOT just exploitative girl imprison drama life). Particularly if the fantasies seem more connected with reality. But as it is there is no dramatic stake and a little weirdness of girls in beds in lingerie critiquing "the dance" in place of our women bonding over and providing a real soul. A soul that is torn out at random.

And can anyone figure out what was the deal with Gorksy and Blue or why Babydoll didn't just tell Gorksy she was being lobotomized? This movie is full of externalized imagery that makes no since. And I HATE the dragon mission "watch out fellas the hot girl wants to intercision into you long john and yank your spark stones" Sigh.
 

wolfyrik

New member
Jun 18, 2012
131
0
0
I'm actually expecting Bob's second part to be thirty seconds of the DVD cover, followed by the three seconds of a phrase like "dumbasses. It sucked." or words to that effect. All text, no sound, fade to black.
 

girzwald

New member
Nov 16, 2011
218
0
0
demonsbanenathan said:
.. How can anyone claim Sucker Punch is bad film when people debate it so vociferously?

I come at it from the perspective of it as art - it's incited and encouraged debate, investigation and emotional responses. To me, therefore, it's good.
A movie is good because it causes debate? That has to be the worst logic I've ever heard.
 

merf1350

New member
Sep 1, 2008
155
0
0
I have to admit that Bobs take on what the movie was going for is interesting, and makes sense, but like many I have the whole hot chick thing as motive. On a more artistic bent, though it still tracks back to the previous reason, I looked forward to it as this generations live action version of the Heavy Metal movie. Not the second one, HM2000, but the original. If you take a look at the presentation of the 2 movies, you will see the similarities.
 

RoBi3.0

New member
Mar 29, 2009
709
0
0
I suppose that is one interpretation of the movie. It makes sense, so I get why Bob would come to that conclusion. The thing with art is that it can mean different things to different people.

I loved the movie, for me its message is: that no matter your situation no matter the hand you were dealt in life you have the power the follow your dreamers, only if you are willing to fight for them.

There is tons of dialogue that talks about summoning the courage to fight.

Sweet Pea: And finally this question, the mystery of who's story it will be. Of who draws the curtain. Who is it that chooses our steps in the dance? Who drives us mad? Lashes us with whips and crowns us with victory when we survive the impossible? Who is it, that does all of these things?
Sweet Pea: Who honors those we love for the very life we live? Who sends monsters to kill us, and at the same time sings that we will never die? Who teaches us what's real and how to laugh at lies? Who decides why we live and what we'll die to defend? Who chains us? And Who holds the key that can set us free... It's You. You have all the weapons you need. Now Fight!

Sweet Pea: You can deny angels exist, Convince ourselves they can't be real. But they show up anyway, at strange places and at strange times. They can speak through any character we can imagine. They'll shout through demons if they have to. Daring us, challenging us to fight.

Wiseman: For those who fight for it, life has a flavor the sheltered will never know.

Sweet Pea: Everyone has an Angel. A Guardian who watches over us. We can't know what form they'll take. One day, old man. Next day, little girl. But don't let appearances fool you, they can be as fierce as any dragon. Yet they're not here to fight our battles, but to whisper from our heart. Reminding that it's us. Its everyone of us who holds power over the world we create.

That is what the movie means to me anyhow.
 

Ramzal

New member
Jun 24, 2011
414
0
0
This video is kinda like a guy, running through the street yelling "I'm not crazy! I'll show you! I'LL SHOW YOU ALL!" lol
 

ensouls

New member
Feb 1, 2010
140
0
0
So I shouldn't hate it because it's misogynist, I should hate it because it's incompetent? OK, that's fine.
 

008Zulu_v1legacy

New member
Sep 6, 2009
6,019
0
0
I liked the movie. It wasn't great, but it was good. The man behind it made 300, so I figured that it'd be worth the watch.

Didn't get the whole subtext you pointed out, Mr Snyder does tend to put people representing the polar ends of a particular trope in as characters, so the subtlety was lost on me there. In hindsight it makes sense.
 

kingmob

New member
Jan 20, 2010
187
0
0
This movie is the very definition of pretentious, not much more can be said about it, sorry.
 

Spookimitsu

New member
Aug 7, 2008
327
0
0
Cyfu said:
Although I would imagine the majority watched it for these reasons
Normally, I would have been with you for those exact same sentiments, but honestly I'm tired of action movies with little to no integrity (by that I mean what happened to classically trained martial artists - as opposed to pretty Hollywood girls being given 2 months of Cinematic wushu). Any half-brained google search can lead to thighs and cleavage. But if a movie is being billed as incorporating martial arts, then (I would hope) it would have authentic practitioners *cough*Matrix*cough, cough*.

These were mainly the reasons I didn't want to see Suckerpunch. I'm tired of pretty non-fighting girls doing fighting movies. (Charlies Angels, Kill Bills, Azumi etc etc)
I can guarantee you that they don't know the difference between a tachi and a katana and a B-25 Mitchell before reading the script (Aya may be excused from that). While I pulled that facts of that last statement right out my ass, i'd bet my lunch and my fancy hat that it would be true more often than not.
I love the arms and armour of feudal Japan, I'm just also tired of them being whored out when ever a director needs a double-dose of bad-assery. I distinctly remember feeling detraction from the film trailer for the same reason i feel detraction to anime that tries to do the same thing, what with the Nihonjin schoolgirl outfits being is juxtapositioned to 'stimulating' sexually suggestive sequences and action. Gag reflex suppression.

In other news, the fights in Haywire were ok. Thank goodness for Donny Yen. Me and my Sanjuro avatar are going to go watch Fighter in the Wind, but join me next week as i rant about the 'Behind the editing room door "Slow Motion" button abuse'.