airpirate.

some thoughts about sucker punch, a pretty bad movie i saw on friday

i am pretty bad at most things, reviewing movies especially. but i’m trying, and that’s (arguably) a good thing

it’s easy to tell that the movie is kind of lazily pushing “girl empowerment,” but in that hollow, spice girls way, where you’re only as empowered as the products you buy or whatever.

to me, “sucker punch” is a movie that was designed solely to produce visually interesting trailers. Like kids shows that were built as a vehicle for toy sales, but for adults.

oh also the music was horrible. straight-up train hitting a puppy bad.

there was one really good scene in the movie, it went something like this: emily browning just made it into the asylum, and in a series of fast-motion jumps, her week in captivity is shown. then, browning gets strapped into a chair and is being prepped for her lobotomy. as the icepick is being eased into her eye, the lights flash for a second, and when they come back up, we’re on a stage set, and a girl (playing the part of the lobotomist) complains to the director that lobotomies aren’t sexy.

i laughed. it was the only time that i responded how the director intended me to for the rest of the movie’s runtime. this was twenty minutes into the film.

[just gonna warn you, since it’s a new movie there are spoilers in this hot mess of a review. but seriously, don’t watch sucker punch, it is a butt movie with small blips of good ideas (mostly some good visuals) sprinkled here or there.]

random thoughts that came up while watching this movie, in rough chronological order:

it was like five minutes until the first emily browning cameltoe shot, i think my eyes rolled hard enough for them to be audible in the theater right then.

whoever told the director that spelling out the film’s title in raindrops on a car window was a good idea is probably the greatest practical-joke-smith of our generation.

i wonder if zach snyder (the writer/director) has some sort of neural/ocular disorder that alters his perceptions; all his backgrounds in every movie look like a bad instagram filter, and are flat in a really off-putting way.

jumping from an insane asylum to a brothel was pretty cheap, but i think that was part of the plan.

giving the girls nicknames (baby doll, sweet-pea, blondie [ a brunette. i bet snyder high-fived himself after that one]) was pretty dumb, especially due to the fact that they aren’t characterized other than “the one that complains” and “the other girls”

whoever decided on music for this movie deserves a week in the stocks. why would you use such a horrible cover of “where is my mind?”

emily browning, your weird sway when you start dancing/retreat into a fantasy world of violence inside of a fantasy world of sexual abuse and tight clothes makes me worried that you have an inner ear disorder, please see a doctor.

in zach snyder’s “sucker punch,” all women are basically mannequins: posed, hollow, and pulled out as an excuse to show off some skimpy clothes.

people keep saying it’s snyder’s first original movie. that is a lie. this is “the worst parts of the internet, especially 4chan and deviantart: the movie”

the old guy is just a robot programmed to spout out a catchphrase every time he is onscreen. He maybe provided actual exposition once in the whole movie.

there was zero tension in the whole film. during the first fight, i knew that the battles were gonna be like a video game where someone activated the “god mode” cheat. it was ridiculous. bullets were whizzing everywhere, and no one got shot.

since the movie never shows browning dance, i tried to imagine what made her moves so hypnotizing. all i could come up with is that she does “the robot” really well.

i didn’t really feel anything when he killed three of the five main characters, since the story never got to the point where they anything approaching rounded. i can’t even say for sure if they were even as much as two-dimensional at any point.

from watching this, two things come to mind about the director. first, zach snyder seems like the kind of guy who says “bitchin’” a lot, signs his name with a lightning bolt at the end, and describes his car like he was talking about a woman. the kind of guy i would hate intensely. second, he as some kind of weird crossed wire in his head w/r/t sex + violence. i get the feeling that he has a lot of weird bedtime fantasies.

one thing that may have redeemed this movie: remember that giant joint they had in one of the cheech and chong movies? the one the width of a fire extinguisher? i bet if had finished that off, this would have been a great experience.

that was my report on “sucker punch.” it was bad and basically poop in most ways. apologies about my writing style/lack of ability, i’ll fix it once i’ve had some sleep.