Sucker Punch (2011)

Sucker Punch has an inconsistent appeal that will satisfy a limited audience, a failure of marketing and effort. The explosion-filled action and digitally-powered visuals will appeal to all modern audiences, but the layered plot will be confusing and test their attention spans. The eroticism of the cast of women will get appeal mass appeal from boys to young men, but their young ages will turn away older men. The explosion-filled action and digitally-powered visuals will appeal to all modern audiences, but the layered plot will be confusing and test their attention spans. Zach Snyder's first attempt to express his own ideas is a pathetic mess that fails miserably; proving that technical talents, alone, cannot form a strong film.

We are taken into the fantasy world(s) of Babydoll (Emily Browning) who is deemed insane when she tries to stop her stepfather from killing her sister. When she overhears her stepfather and one of the orderlies, Blue Jones (Oscar Isaac), making a deal to have her lobotomized in 5 days, she escapes to her first fantasy world. The all-female mental hospital is substituted for a brothel with the girls as dancers and Mr. Blue as their pimp. Babydoll has a plan to escape, and she gains the support of her fellow dancers: Rocket (Jena Malone), Sweetpea (Abbie Cornish), Blondie (Vanessa Hudgens), and Amber (Jamie Chung).   Her plan consists of her dancing her hypnotic dance for some of the colorful characters of the brothel, but that isn't where it ends.

When she dances, Babydoll goes into yet another fantasy world. To reach their freedom Babydoll and her squad of kinkily dressed femme fatales must fight their way through a new world for all the 5 objects they much retrieve- a map, fire, a key, a knife, and "the answer." Equipped with weapons that range from samurai swords to giant, robotic war machines. I did guiltily enjoyed the first two CGI induced settings even with all their outrageousness - the first world has giant metal samurais with rocker launchers and the second has nazi zombies (yes, I said nazi zombies!) decked out in robotic suits. There is an ongoing obession with robots. But by the third "mission" where Snyder shows off his inner Lord of the Rings fanboy, my patience is gone and stupidity has taken over.

A cast of beautiful women, lead by talented   Emily Browning (The Uninvited), is squandered. Abbie Cornish's performance  as the aggressive doubter Sweetpea isn't solid but by the time we realize it was actually supposed to be vital to the film it is too late. Even tween idol Vanessa Hudgens (High School Musical) has a solid role as Blondie where some talent flashes through. Unfortunately, their entire appeal is set on their eye-candy looks and outfits that are straight out of a whorehouse. Each girl has her own moment of badassatry, and all succeed in making this mess of a film nicer to look at. But once the action stops and they try to appeal to us in a deeper way the shallowness of the film is revealed.

Oscar Isaac's performance as the brothel owner/orderly Bleu Jones is the only consistent performance - see if you can find find him in the noirish thriller, Drive (2011). Playing the role of a villainous sadist abusing power, he is satisfying, yet also nothing special. Scott Glenn is the chameleon of the film with a new role for every world. His performance consists of changing outfits only to mutter the same idiotic "words of wisdom" for each character. The last significant male in the film is Jon Hamm who is the star of the award-winning AMC television series, Mad Me. Jon Hamm's appearance is tragically short, he is in two cameos as the lobotomist - his role is made much more significant in the extended cut. The men of female dominated Sucker Punch are wasted goods.

Snyder first showed us his talents at creating overloaded CGI effects and stop-motion action sequences with 300 (2007). Every location was digitally animated and all action sequences featured slow-motion movements and intense close-ups on the violence. Snyder is one of the unfortunate filmmakers who puts tireless effort into the visual aspects of their films, but fail miserably to create a coherent story or formulate ideas that have any purpose for being shoved into our ears. His adaption of Watchmen is the only film he has been able to use to craft a well-organized plot, but he had great source material to guide him. Sucker Punch is his attempt to create something original which he achieves, but this film is a pile of smashed together ideas that just won't get cleaned up. What made it impossible for me to just enjoy the stupid entertainment of the film are the pathetically desperate attempts to bring some depth into a hollow film.

I have no doubt that Sucker Punch will develop a following, people are suckers for these visual treats. After watching something like this, I get a sick feeling in my stomach because I realize that this is the path films are taking; audiences choose to watch these CGI disasters over almost anything else. Those rare times when CGI is used with a purpose are becoming even harder to find - Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life is one of the few recent examples. When a visuals are just thrown together without any purpose, expecting us to like them just because they look interesting, they become ugly. This is what Snyder does with this film, and that is what this film is - ugly.