Review of Sucker Punch (2011) by Bret P — 22 Jan 2013

Monumentally dull piece of fantasy action from director Zack Synder. In an attempt to claim his late wife's inheritance Babydoll's stepfather confines her to a mental institution (after she accidentally shoots and kills her sister while trying to protect her from their brutish stepfather), paying off the head of the hospital to lobotomise her so she can no longer lay claim to her mother's money or speak out about him.

While incarcerated Babydoll (Emily Browning) mentally escapes to a fantasy world in the form of a grim, bizarre 1940's prison for strippers - where she discovers she has the ability to mesmerise anyone that watches her dance, and while doing so flits off (again) to another series of imagined worlds where she and fellow patients/dancers must battle their audience's subconscious, represented by Nazi zombies, giant samurai or dragons.

The girls use this to their advantage in an attempt to escape from the prison/strip club. The film is one long testament to how action with no emotional engagement is the dullest thing imaginable. The world within worlds premise executed so sublimely in 'Inception' is massively ill-conceived here, and as the girls are never under any physical danger or following any firm narrative the action sequences are comparable to watching someone else play a videogame, but with less excitement.

In many ways it's structured like a game, with levels set against a variety of backdrops and a boss battle at the end, punctuated with clunky cut scenes throughout that attempt to inject some essence of narrative.

All the characters are 2D (at best), and have absolutely zero development or personality, but even the finest actors would struggle to instil any interest into this turgid script. Emily Browning is hideously miscast as Babydoll, and her pretty but expressionless face lacks any of the charisma or screen presence required to carry the picture - leaving her woodenly reading off lines and blinking in slow motion.

As if the boring exposition and action wasn't enough it frequently cuts to music montages with dire indie covers of well known classics (The Stooges, Pixies) - fundamentally pop videos that create further distance from what little story there is.

All cut to come in at a 12A It feels like a cynical attempt at capturing the lucrative market of young teenage boys AND girls, with titillating flesh and epic CGI violence, coupled with a feisty all female cast and attempted 'touching relationships' - however it has clearly been written by someone with no idea what girls enjoy in a movie, leaving it alienating for every audience.

For a film that contains some amazing components - Strippers! Nazi Zombies! Dragons! - it is far worse than it deserves to be, a truly horrible mind-numbing experience.