Sucker Punch

I had heard the bad reviews, but was trying to keep an open mind going into Sucker Punch. And let me tell you the beginning was amazing, the first five minutes were so perfect in getting you hooked on this movie. The music is perfectly creepy and ominous, the colours are drab and eerie, and the fact that there is no dialogue is really cool. The cinematography throughout the whole movie is really amazing, the angles and closeups and lighting gives this movie an edge, I really wish I was watching it in HD. This is a good looking movie that your eyes will enjoy (and I'm not talking about the girls).

Things go a little downhill from there. This movie asks way too many questions without answering them. Now I am a huge LOST fan, and am thusly used to unanswered questions, and just like the LOST finale, the ending of this movie didn't really satisfy me. I had a lot of questions that were left unanswered (they were all in heaven?!).

Before I go any further, I should probably tell you what the movie is about. Our main girl, Babydoll (why are the names so stupid?), is institutionalized by her awful stepfather, there she imagines an alternate reality where she makes a plan to escape. It's one of those "which parts are reality?" movies, and I don't really see what is gained from her going (in her mind) from the nut-house to the whore-house - her mother and sister just died, and she is imagining herself trying to escape from being de-virginized by the "high-roller"? Random. All those fighting scenes could have been imagined from in the nut-house and worked just as well (possibly better from a making sense point of view). I suspect that a whore-house is more sexy and sexiness is definitely something this movie struggles with.

If you know anything about Sucker Punch you probably know there is a group of sexy young girls fighting awesomely, one is always wearing like a sailor-type outfit. This movie was definietly marketed towards guys, and I'm sure a lot of guys were dissapointed. Sure the outfits are sexy enough, but there is no sexy dancing (only the promise of), no boobies, no seduction. And for a movie that takes part largely in a whore-house, this came as a surprise to me, and I'm sure a bigger surprise to the guys who were hoping for more.

Okay, so the whore-house and the nut-house were all well and fine, but those random action scenes were so non-sensical and awful, I dreaded each time a new one started and looked forward to its end. For example, in one scene the girls fight Steampunk robot Nazis during WWII. The next one is like demon guys in armour, medieval style, and a dragon, but the girls are in a plane and have guns and stuff. SOMETHING DOESN'T FIT HERE! Okay, most all of it doesn't fit.

Again the music was pretty good throughout, it set the atmosphere perfectly, and there were some neat covers. The cinematography (and computer graphics) were also well done, I kept thinking "that looks so cool" while I was watching. The acting was reasonable, Vanessa Hudgens was definitely the weakest link (goodbye), and I was happy to see John Hamm in a small role. The ending was cute, but not satisfying. The parts I could make sense of were okay. But like I said at the beginning, if the first five minutes hook you, get ready for two hours of not-so-sexy-non-sensical-fighting.

This movie is a feast for your eyes but not for your brain.