Sucker Punch is a movie with no soul. It is 100 minutes of pop culture coolness specifically geared towards boys who like girls and giant explosions. Its lack of spiritual essence comes from its unapologetic means of not explaining itself and frankly not caring if you don’t get the gist. I understand some things in movies are meant to not be explained and it may even be an appropriate critique to say that many movies today explain too much and hand hold the audience like children who don’t know how the cross the proverbial street. Yet, this movie feels the need to not explain itself because it is really just about looking cool. The movie opens up in a brilliantly crafted music video that weaves the beginnings of a high-revved revenge flick. It is the type of plot I consider such an irresistible guilty pleasure I literally drool when the premise is set. By the time the curtain sets, the one plot line you hope to be resolved is literally spat on and you’re steered to care for the plight of a sole surviving character that is given no back story. This is likely because the whole point of the movie is to fill the middle with such mind numbing Inception/Wizard of Oz dream battles that by the end your eyes have been raped so hard you don’t care how the movie ends.
I can’t fault the movie too hard. In the end I think you get what you were expecting: a punch in the face with “cool” visuals and battle scenes. I just can’t say it makes a great movie. I think the almost good movies fail on their own premises. Movies where I leave feeling there was potential in its narrative but eventually falls flat tend to be the most disappointing to me. Crap like Epic Movie and….well every movie that’s title ends with Movie….I can just ignore and not care too much about. The upsetting thing about Sucker Punch is it has potential but suffers from what I can only describe as complete incompetence in plot and writing. Honestly, if they filmed some intermeddling scenes of the real insane asylum that could have injected some reality, character flaws and weaknesses between all the ridiculously powerful ass-kicking scenes it would have created the kind of juxtaposition I am left only thinking they meant to convey. And again, if the film’s ending focused primarily on the plot we buy into at the beginning and not some weird abstract guardian angel BS I may be more forgiving. I can only imagine the ending to Sucker Punch was a quick fix to an utterly nonsensical finish that they sought to cheaply fix by adding voiceover narrative to the beginning and end. If that was an honest attempt, then disgrace and shame are two words that only start to describe what I witnessed. This would not bother me as much if I didn’t see potential in the idea of a Girl, Interrupted meets Inception meets (insert favorite war/ninja/fantasy action movie). You can take this as I’m never satisfied and just feel like I could have done better, my response is you see this movie and try not to feel like someone just didn’t care or stopped trying.
OVERALL: C When it comes to mindless entertainment and if what you’re looking for is to just stare at something cool for 100 minutes, this the perfect serving. The fight scenes and CG are really well done and so over-the-top that you can’t help but enjoy that part of the show, some other scenes mix really well with the music and would have made award-winning music videos by themselves while the rest (dialogue/characters/story) is trash. Putting these all together don’t quite average out for the better.
Last note:
I have heard that this movie was to symbolize female strength or power in one way or another. I find this to be slightly disturbing. Though the film may convey a type of mental strength among females, the majority of characters are extremely weak when closer to the “real world” in the movie and their personalities so one-dimensional it leads only to conclude the idea of female strength is a ruse to justify abusing the coolness of attractive women shooting guns and swinging swords without it appearing too much like a teenage boy’s fantasy. At the very least, the women are not as scantily clad as they probably could have been…could that be what they meant?