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

1337mokro

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So in the end... Bob is repeating what other people have said.

It's a huge mess stumbling over itself attempting to satire a bad movies that use and exploit sex to appeal to a male demographic whilst itself becoming a horrible movie that exploits sex that appeals to no one (some people might still like it).

We SOOOO needed 2 videos for this. Especially a video telling us that we are ALL wrong about it... when in the end you end up coughing up a chewed up message already uttered by others. I even saw some forum folks doing what cost 2 weeks and 2 videos in about a single paragraph of text.
 

mrblakemiller

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I really think the point of the last video was, "Sucker Punch didn't suck and you're wrong for thinking it did," and the point of this one was, "Sucker Punch was saying something you might not have noticed."

It seems like Bob noticed how aggresive he was last time and is now trying to back away from his, "Everyone is dumb but me," usual schtick. For that, I am grateful.
 

minuialear

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Revolutionaryloser said:
minuialear said:
SonOfVoorhees said:
-snip-
This might come as a bit of a surprise for you both but... some women like to dress up in sexy clothes. I know, I was as dumbfounded as you when I found out. I'm saying this from experience, you see I actually went to visit an actual tribe of women where they were wearing, I fuck you not, clothes that weren't covering 100% of their skin. Pretty shocking stuff. They even like to watch TV shows with women who aren't shrouded in burqas.

I wish I had some way of understanding this apparent total contradiction with what previous studies have indicated, but given that we have yet to actually decypher language the females use, we have no way of asking them.
I'm just going to requote myself...

minuialear said:
While I would allow for the possibility in a better movie that their sexualized costumes in the fantasy world (a world which they created to escape the sexual nightmare of their reality) are a way for them to try and reclaim their sexuality in a manner that works for them...that's far from how it comes out in the film. There are PLENTY of scenes we could all point to and think "Fanservice!!" because of how over-the-top they are in that regard, or because it's super obvious that the scene was made for guys to think the characters were cool/sexy, rather than because the characters would think this was cool. (I'll point out here that at no point in the entire film, as far as I remember, do any of the female leads indicate that fighting or sci-fi/fantasy worlds are things they personally enjoy and would fantasize about, and that therefore Snyder gives us no reason to assume there was any reason to have them doing so other than because he thought it would look cool/he decided to try for symbolism using things he finds are a good form of escape, but which aren't shown to be what his CHARACTERS find are good forms of escape. Which, you know, kinda undermines the whole "Look at how clever this movie is!" argument.) Etc, etc.
EDIT: Also can't tell if that last part is a joke or not, so I'll assume the worst until you tell me otherwise: I tend to have no problems talking to and understanding women, though that may be because I talk to them like they're normal people and not another species that others can't communicate with.
 

Aiddon_v1legacy

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irishda said:
I'll say the same thing about Sucker Punch that I said about Cabin in the Woods. When a movie scolds an audience purely for being the audience, then who the fuck is this movie FOR? Who's supposed to be the one that will enjoy this movie?
usually it's the writer's ego. It's a way for them to placate themselves probably from being criticized by audiences or by critics. It's a way for writers to think they're automatically clever without having to condemn themselves as well in the process (see also: deconstruction). Some films can do it well, but it takes a good writer to pull it off which Snyder ISN'T. Like a lot of very talented visual directors when he writes something it is CRAP (just look at Terrence Mallick's filmography).
 

PunkRex

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Shit, remind me to bring splunking equipment next time Bob, this got deep and I hit my brain, now I can't smart... derp.
 

TKretts3

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All I can say is that having a message and being good are not the same thing. A good movie needs to have at least somewhat of a message, but simply having a message doesn't make a movie good.
 

PunkRex

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Revolutionaryloser said:
Darth_Payn said:
bz316 said:
I'm not sure what's worst: having a movie pretty much call me an asshole, or (assuming Bob is correct in his assessment of the film's intentions) the fact that I totally deserved it...
Hey now, don't think like that. Zack Snyder's probably the true asshole for calling his audience the assholes for DARING to like the stuff he put into his movie.
I think the other things to hate about Sucker Punch is that, as poorly characterized as they were, we wanted the girls to escape, and only the "bitchy" one did. That last minute protagonist switch at the end was just dick-slap.
It's telling that the least trampy of the girls is the one you consider a *****.
I could say the same about how you refered to the others as 'trampy'. Although I agree with you about how wanting Sweet Pea to escape the least simply because shes a little 'bitchy' (which is understandable given her situation) is kind of cold (even though the negative character in any situation is the one people tend to relate to the least) calling the others tramps is just as harsh.
 

Minjen

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Hey. Remember that quote from Tremors 2 ?they've been acting so smart because they're so stupid?? Someone we know made an entire episode about politicians on that. Same could be said for this movie.
 

minuialear

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Revolutionaryloser said:
minuialear said:
Translating what I said and thereby sucking all fun out of life, maybe women like wearing nice clothes and being sexy and neither of those things are the problem the film is trying to address and women should be free to wear nice clothes and be sexy if that's what they want.
I'm well aware that it's possible that a woman would like to be sexy without wanting to be so because guys like sexy women (and for the third time, in a different movie, I could buy the argument that they continue to wear the skimpy outfits in the fantasy world in order to reclaim that sexuality). However, Sucker Punch does not convey that message effectively (if at all). What part of those fantasy scenes indicates any forethought other than "Hey, this looks cool; let's have them do this because it's what I think is cool!" ? Also keep in mind who wrote/directed/produced this film, and what he is known for doing (e.g., sucking the meaning out of other works he's adapted to make them look cool and edgy). The combination doesn't paint a pretty picture for the argument that he actually thought about having them reclaim their sexuality through skimpy outfits in sci-fi/fantasy worlds stylized in ways we've already seen in some of Snyder's previous work. And even if we assume that he really did mean for that to be in the film...it still doesn't come off as being that intelligent. At all.

Also, I'd love it if somebody one day pointed out where in that film is there a fanservice moment provided that the person knows what fanservice means.
Unfortunately I don't have Youtube access so I can't do that at present...will try to remember to do so at a later point.

EDIT: Actually, this article explains it pretty concisely: http://missmediajunkie.blogspot.com/2011/04/so-sucker-punch.html

Ignoring the part of them being scantily clad (even though I disagree that it's the case, I'll allow for the purpose of this discussion that maybe the lack of clothing is supposed to actually be an empowering thing); I'd say the most astute commentary indicating fanservice is:

female characters who are all of age but visually read as adolescents. Hence the fetish costuming, the sickly-sweet nicknames, and the fantasy sequences full of common video game tropes. A period heroine like Baby Doll would have no frame of reference for an inner fantasy world full of seedy bordellos, killer robots, and samurai warriors. Instead, if I had to guess, the inside of her head would probably look more like Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland," a film with a far more female-friendly fantasy aesthetic that much of the target audience of "Sucker Punch" reviled on principle.
The fanservice is in the fetish adolescent look (Babydoll's supposed to be 20, let's not forget), the video game tropes and imagery in the fantasy scenes (though you could argue they're there just as much for Snyder's enjoyment as they're there for the audience), and the fact that the characters, as crafted in the film, would have absolutely no motivation to be dreaming about samurai with guns or robot armies, and therefore it's incredibly hard to seriously argue that those scenes are anything but Snyder either showing an (possibly assumed male) audience things they'll find super-cool, or showing the audience things that he finds super-cool.
 

the1Jugg

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When I heard the line about "angels" at the beginning it made me wonder while I was watching who the angel is. At first I thought the old man was Baby Doll's angel, but then at the end when she says that it wasnt her story, it made me wonder if Baby Doll is Sweet Pea's angel, and that the old man is... God
 

The Lugz

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nice episodes, but i cant help but point out the film has a synopsis;

A young girl is institutionalized by her abusive stepfather. Retreating to an alternative
reality as a coping strategy, she envisions a plan which will help her escape from the mental
facility

i read that as meaning the only real character is sweet-pea, she escaped from the mental hospital her delusions sacrificed themselves for her mental well being,
sans Alice in wonderland
 

Dr Jones

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SonOfVoorhees said:
Or the message could be "Woman are hypocrites?" as in men should not sexualise woman....but woman still use there sexuality to there advantage.
I think that's an awfully stupid message to send. It's not only generalizing as fuck, it's also quite obvious that EVERYONE is a hypocrite at some point.
 

faefrost

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A noble or complex underlying story idea does not make up for a painful or just outright bad execution. Nor does overanalyzing a movie after the fact make up for the simple fact that your first instaincts regarding whether you left the theater feeling like you enjoyed the movie are probably the right response. Suckerpunch was absolutely awful. It had some great ideas. But it was too confused and disjointed, and for the most part left the audience pissed off at the filmaker.

Plus we should always be wary of critics or professors having us hyper analyze anything after the fact. You can talk up or justify almost anything as being supposedly better than your initial mind knows it to actually be. As an example, play these two episodes again. Now go watch Paul Verhoven's "Showgirls". Notice how all of Bob's layered nuances regarding misogeny and feminism and reversals etc etc can be applied almost 100% in the same way to that film? You can almost hear Bob's narration as you watch it. Now has it improved your view of it any? were you wrong, or is it in fact still just a steaming pile of dog sh@t?
 

Ukomba

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If nothing else, you're review of the movie was entertaining, but it comes off a little like the people who ascribe some deep meaning to Prometheus. It seems all a film maker has to do is be cryptic, and people will pop up to figure it out. A smart film maker or writer would then just have to pick the best or most interesting interpretation and run with it.
 

daxterx2005

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Glad these are over, I disliked the film so these reviews didn't really tickle my fancy. I hope we get some more "TV IS WEIRD" next week :D