'Sucker Punch' Movie Review

I've been a fan of Zack Snyder's since his Dawn of the Dead remake. Loved 300, thought he did an admirable job tackling a nearly unfilmable movie with his big screen adaptation of Watchmen, and I believe Legend of the Guardians was incredibly gorgeous and a faithful version of Kathryn Lasky's Guardians of Ga'Hoole books. But Sucker Punch, Snyder's twisted fantasy tale set in a Vermont mental institute in the '60s, left me wondering what it was Snyder was trying to do and disappointed over the fact his storytelling skills let him down this time.

As with Snyder's previous films, Sucker Punch is visually stunning. The action scenes are bizarre yet riveting, the costume design is freakishly sexy, and the sets are first-rate. Cinematographer Larry Fong (reuniting with Snyder after shooting both 300 and Watchmen) doesn't need a bunch of fancy tricks to adequately capture the mood, the drama, or the action. If looks were everything, Sucker Punch would earn an easy A. But, unfortunately, Snyder - working for the first time on an original story rather than an adaptation - and co-writer Steve Shibuya's story and dialogue don't live up to the incredibly fun action bits.

Sucker Punch - The Story

Abbie Cornish ('Sweet Pea') described the film as being "about five girls who band together to escape a psychiatric ward in the '60s. The story is linear but operates on three different levels: a reality, a sub-reality, and a dream world." And that's Sucker Punch in a nutshell.

Babydoll (Emily Browning) is taken to a mental hospital after her evil stepfather lies to the police and says she killed her younger sister. He pays off an intern (Oscar Isaac) to have her lobotomized, thus ensuring she'll never be able to tell her side of the story (the stepfather, angry over being bypassed for a family inheritance in favor of Babydoll and her sister, actually did the killing). As the doctor (Jon Hamm in 2 of his 5 minutes on screen) prepares to stick the tool into her brain through her eye, Babydoll escapes from the horrific reality of it all into a fantasy world in which her fellow prisoners/patients are all locked up in a brothel run by Blue (the intern) and forced to dance (and more) for wealthy men. The 'more' is implied but not shown, and the same goes for the sexy dancing.

Now, while in that fantasy world, Babydoll further fantasizes a video game-inspired world in which she's told by a wise man (Scott Glenn) that in order to escape she must collect five items. This conversation with the wise man is taking place while Babydoll's performing her erotic moves in front of Blue, his bodyguards, and some of her fellow prisoners.

Babydoll convinces four of her fellow prisoners - Blondie (Vanessa Hudgens), Amber (Jamie Chung), Rocket (Jena Malone) and her sister Sweet Pea (Cornish) - to help her steal the items, laying out a plan in which she'll dance to distract the men while they go after the necessary items.

The Acting

The costumes are mix of school girl sexy and leather & bondage chic, and how the actresses pulled off some of their stunts wearing those skimpy things is a significant feat. Emily Browning is the lead here, pulling the story together as we see Babydoll go from frightened orphan to a woman capable of bringing grown men to their knees using either her dance moves or actual weapons. The makeup (including mile-long eyelashes), costumes and lighting give Browning a luminescence, and she's simply gorgeous. Acting-wise, she and Abbie Cornish are way ahead of their co-stars in being able to take these characters and make them more than caricatures. Cornish is particularly effective, showing both strength and emotional vulnerability as the older sister who's so protective of her younger sibling that she wound up being locked up alongside her in a mental hospital.

Carla Gugino (Watchmen) adopts a Polish accent to play Dr. Vera Gorski, the head of the medical team (which apparently is actually made up of only the good doctor) and as Madame Gorski, the head mistress of the brothel and dance teacher for all the young ladies. She also had to put up with what must have felt like 20 extra pounds of weight on her head with a bizarre bouffant. And, as with her younger co-stars, Gugino's physical assets are played up in Sucker Punch. Saddled with the accent and big hair, Gugino still manages to take a comic book-ish character and make it work better than it has any right to.

The Bottom Line

Sucker Punch's multiple realities involve scenes featuring dragons, red-eyed gigantic samurai warriors, Orcs (which Snyder must have gotten on loan from Peter Jackson's The Hobbit set), Nazi zombies, an aerial force made up of zeppelins, B-25 bombers, and a bunny helicopter thing, as well as a grotesquely fat cook with a collection of knives. Babydoll and her cohorts use video-game inspired moves (I really expected a life/energy meter to pop up on the side of the screen during the battles) to take on all comers in some extremely intense, visually engaging, just plain cool to look at fight sequences. It's definitely not the action of Sucker Punch that lets down viewers.

The trailers are a little misleading, and that's likely been done on purpose. Had the real plot been laid out in those 30 second teasers, the movie might not have been as appealing to the teenage girls who are part of the target audience. And while the movie appears to be about female empowerment with its five female leads getting the best of orcs, samurai warriors, and much more, there's a mixed message in that the fighting takes place while Babydoll is apparently mesmerizing men with extremely erotic dances (which aren't shown). Am I not understanding something here? Did I miss the message?

The girls are able to attempt to obtain items needed to secure their freedom all because Babydoll gyrates and moans and the men pant. I believe calling all the actions that stem from seeing a young girl forced to turn on men by dancing 'female empowerment' can only be done by using the most warped and misguided definition of the term. And because I believed going in that seeing strong females fight against the powers that want to hold them hostage was part of what Sucker Punch was all about, actually watching the method used to propel these women into taking action was a huge letdown. Sexy dancing in erotic outfits? I never believed these hypnotic dance numbers, which are not shown, were acts of defiance, although I'm sure that's the way they're meant to be perceived.

Sucker Punch is a comic book-like fantasy minus a solid plot complete with women in skimpy outfits and creatures lifted off the pages of graphic novels. And for a film that sets out to show the power of women, it too often reinforces stereotypes instead of breaking free of them.

GRADE: C-

Sucker Punch was directed by Zack Snyder and is rated PG-13 for thematic material involving sexuality, violence and combat sequences, and for language.

Theatrical Release: March 25, 2011

This review is based on a screening provided by the studio. For more information, please see our Ethics Policy.