Don't Drink The Koolaid - SuckerPunch

2 out of 5 Popcorn Kernels

SEE TRAILER HERE

Sucker Punch reminds me of real punch...tasty when you put it in your mouth, but boring when you present it.


Sucker Punch is a menagerie of sights and sounds; the look is a cross between Sin City and 300 - and of course it is done by the same director; but the script is so convoluted and scattered, it feels as if it was created from other scripts that were pulled out of a pile of rejects. Now...if you want something that is eye catching, this would be it, but the look of Sucker Punch only excites for an hour before you get bored, and try to understand the subplot.


The plot stars off promising, with a 20 year old girl named Babydoll (Emily Browning) is sent to the crazy house by her stepfather (Gerard Plunkett), who we later find out was very upset when the mother passed away and left her fortune not to him, but to Babydoll and her younger sister. Well, the stepfather is seen abusing the sexually abusing the young girls, and when Babydoll steps in to try to save her younger sister, she is accidentally killed. The Stepfather blames the death on Babydoll, thus insuring the stepfather gets the inheritance. The Stepfather says the girl was insane, and institutionalizes her - paying the attendant there part of his riches to make sure she stays there; and the attendant forges papers to have her lobotomized.

Pussy Cat Dolls of the Future

This is where Sucker Punch starts its plot, for Babydoll meets a Dr. Vera Gorski (Carla Gugino), who seems to sympathize with the girl, and tells her the only way for her to survive her stay here until her operation, is to basically "escape within herself", which she does, by fantasizing her environment, and a few friends she has made, into some sort of espionage group bound for escape.


Suckerpunch tries to meld reality with fantasy all within look that seems very Gothic, ethereal, and music video (it does have a rocking soundtrack). But without a cohesive storyline, it fails greatly to capture the reason for all this dreaming Babydoll's does in order to escape from the trauma's of her life and deal with her present reality.


It sets up a strange quest where a Wise Man (Scott Glenn), tell her that she has to obtain five items in order to escape - and at first, I believed she was escaping in reality, but after dwelling on the film later, I believe she was escaping from the five-days or so left before her mind was to be surgically removed; and her sanity was the reward. Quite frankly, I would prefer to go crazy a little early.


The scenes with her and her friends going through this quest, also touches on Babydoll's reality too, as certain items and actions cross over, and some subplots go deeper into the dream. This just turns out to be a movie about some hot looking girls for the male movie-going audience as most of the dream sequences take place in a brothel, and Babydoll and her friends are all clad in Pussycat Dolls (some irony in that name don't you think) outfits strutting around bonding, fighting, and dying.


...It all left me a little drowsy, yet very afraid to dream again.