I'm seriously looking forward to this. check out the trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrIiYSdEe4E&feature=related

From the guy who directed 300. The film should be terrible. It's basically like Stained Future was given millions of dollars to make a movie. It's a nerd's dream. But it looks amazing.

An insane asylum, hot girls in short skirts wielding katanas, Nazis, bi-planes, blimps, robots, samurai mecha with miniguns, dragons...

It's nuts. But I want it so badly.

 

Do want.

Also;
http://forums.darklordpotter.net/showthread.php?t=16773
http://forums.darklordpotter.net/showthread.php?t=17537

 

Not sure if anybody is interested but, concept art for the movie.

I follow quite a few conceptual design blogs, Jerad's happens to be one of them. His work is always amazing, and knowing that he worked on this increases my hopes that this movie will exceed my (rather low) expectations.

 

It's like they stuffed all my favorite genres into one movie and then made it Inception.

 

You speak of the holy Inc*ption in this thread?

BURN! BURN IN HELL!

 

Went today to see it. And I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand it's a nerds dream - scant clad women with machine guns, swordfights, dragons, etc. But on the other - the plot fells apart in the third act.

Spoiler

The first act is boring. The second act is pure fun - basically everything we saw in the trailers, but more (steam-powered, undead soldiers FTW!). And then comes the third act which in my opinion is a let down. I don't know if Snyder wanted to give some kind of message in the end or he totally lost control over it. Doesn't matter. Ending is bittersweet - I didn't liked it - but it is still a good end.

The acting is decent. Nothing really standing out except Scott Glenn as The Wiseman.

4/5 - mostly for the fantasy section.

 

I fuckin' hate Hungarian movie title translations... They translated Sucker punch to Álomháború which means Dreamwar... I'm currently working on my gf to have her to come with me watch it.

 

So yeah, here's my full review of Sucker Punch, pretensious film critic style. Don't worry, I kept out as much of the spoilers as I possibly could.

So let's first get the good stuff out of the way. The scene structure and cinematography is exactly what you would expect from something under Snyder's direction. It's not as good as Fincher's or Cronenburg's - Snyder really needs to ease off on the slow motion, not everything is a money shot - but it frames the action in stark brutal tones, and it does a really good job of doing it. And the set pieces for the action are just gorgeous - this is some beautiful CGI. Perhaps a little bit too much, because there's not really much of a chance for some of the actresses to give as much of a performance as they could, but it works.

The plot is actually really interesting, and I liked the setup for it. The obvious comparison is Inception, but I don't entirely buy the comparison all that much, namely because the metaphors dreams have in both films are very, very different, although I'd argue they both do offer looks into the film-making mindsets of both filmmakers (but that's a digression for another time).

Oh, and once again, we have a very memorable score for this movie - and most of the time, it's glorious. I loved the songs and score used for the movie, they really set the tone of the entire film - but unlike Watchmen, they never truly overpowered the scenes. One thing's for sure, I'm finding the soundtrack for this movie as soon as I can.

Now, before I get into my problems with it, let me quickly address some criticisms I know will be coming for this film. There are going to be plenty of comments that this movie is simply nerd pandering, with teenage-young adult girls with katanas and machine guns fighting robots and drakes, with a very nasty undercurrent of sexism that runs through the entire film. And I'd like to refute that commentary right away - in fact, let me state this outright: between from I've heard about Little Red Riding Hood and this movie, these flicks are some of the most feminist movies I've seen in a long time. All the main heroes are female - all the main antagonists are male. Both sides are allowed to be sexual, but every attempt onscreen for men to abuse and exploit the girls is always cut away - sometimes literally. All the outfits and posing, most done as if they were lifted straight from an anime or video game, may appear pandering at first glance - until you realize that there's a very strong 'look, but don't touch' feel to this entire film. You're allowed to appreciate the beauty and sexuality - but on another level, you know you can never really approach it.

One of the other major complains is that this movie is really a psychadelic mess - and on that level, you have to be able to go with it. This is a movie that is glorious in its lunacy, and you can easily tell it harkens back to Terry Gilliams' Brazil at points. The multiple layering of reality is intended to be insane and disjointed - and maybe it's just my liking for Kubrick and Cronenburg, but I loved every cut of it - and I can see why a lot of people would hate it or just not get it.

Now the criticisms I have for it - and yes, I will be brief here, because I'm not holding this movie to the same level I held, say, the Harry Potter movies - and that's part of the charm. Every inch of this movie felt like a glorious snapshot of the best insane-asylum/brothel/steampunk/fantasy/sci-fi exploitation movie that never really got made, and you can tell that was what Snyder was going for there. And did he get it?

Well, not quite. For starters, this movie desperately needed an 'R' rating, and it needed it badly. With the way Snyder frames scenes, I wanted the violence in this movie to be just as brutal as Watchmen and just as horrifyingly watchable as Kick-Ass. And considering with the insane budget this movie probably had and the mature subject matter that this movie kept desperately clawing its way towards, I would have loved to see this just go nuts. But on the other hand, I can understand why this movie didn't go for the 'R', namely because it would have involved ramping up other things besides the violence.

And this leads to my second criticism - this is a nasty, nasty movie, and it doesn't help that the main female lead is dressed to look as young as possible. It makes some of the scenes really come off as uncomfortable to watch, and that's before one factors in the implications of the things we don't see. Unfortunately, with an 'R' rating, we probably would have seen things that would make this movie less Kick-Ass and more A Serbian Film - and knowing Snyder's film-making, he probably would have revelled in placing each scene in stark detail (everybody remembers the 'Hallelujah scene' in Watchmen, and I really, really don't want to think about what would have been done with a movie like this with all the bad connotations already in place regarding the environments for these girls).

But here's the other point regarding the nastiness - much of it feels very strongly undercut, and I really couldn't get much of an emotional connection to most of these characters. Most of this comes from Snyder's 'panelesque' film-making, as if he's lifting the scenes straight from a comic panel to the screen - and the fact that he cuts away to preserve the rating. But part of the problem is the plot and the dialogue - because despite the fact that Snyder can shoot a great cinematic scene, his dialogue is just completely underwhelming, with little drama at all. All that great emotion from Watchmen, a lot of it feels leeched away. Part of it is because Snyder's playing it safe, and I really don't think he should have, but another part of it is that some of the scenes just feel wooden as all hell.

And here comes my biggest problem with the movie: the acting. Oh god, the acting. Now, I normally don't hold exploitation films like this to high standards when it comes to acting, but part of the glory of a film in that genre is to give a larger-than-life performance, and none of the actors even seem like they're trying to do that. There's no over-the-top hamminess, there's no real characters that steal scenery or even stand out much as truly incredible personalities. And considering how much this movie emphasizes epic asskicking, that disappointed me. Yes, I get that the 'innocence' of these girls is part of their motif, and it would likely undercut some of the message, but come on! You have hot girls wielding machine guns, katanas, and mechs, and a score to back it up - that's already awesome, but if you had all of the actresses with strong personalities too, the awesomeness would be up to eleven and it would be EPIC.

Most of this problem stems from the main lead, played by Emily Browning, who has exactly two expressions: crying and staring vacantly. Once again, I understand what Snyder was going for, but at least in the action dream sequences, she doesn't even seem to note how fucking awesome what she's doing is! I wanted to see her emote, show some screen presence - but I didn't get that. Abbie Cormish and Jena Malone do a bit better (actually, let me be completely honest - Jena Malone as Rocket kicked all sorts of ass, and she was awesome whenever she was onscreen), but it still feels like they aren't given a huge opportunity to emote as much I'd like to see - and that leads to another problem: I don't see enough of these characters ACTING! Often times, despite how gorgeous the CGI is, it just feels like the scenery and the shot composition is eating them, not giving them a chance to act or emote besides cry and shoot things. Yeah, it's a really bleak movie, I get that, but it doesn't mean they shouldn't have presence on screen.

The other actors are a mixed bag. Jamie Chung and Vanessa Hudgens both equit themselves surprisingly well whenever they're allowed on screen and given a chance to shine (which isn't nearly as often as it should be), Carla Gugino is decent in her role and seems to be enjoying herself when she's given a chance to act, Jon Hamm has great presence when you actually get to see him, and Scott Glenn stands out as one of the best actors in the movie, delivering a 'Wiseman' performance that both has weight and authority. But for me, the biggest problem was Oscar Isaac as the villain - he does deliver a fantastically slimy performance, and he truly comes off as a truly creepy dude, but the guy has no screen presence. He just didn't feel intimidating at all to me, and I really couldn't take him seriously at all. The final dressing room scene did a bit to give him some weight, but it was too little, too late.

I think I've gone on a bit too long regarding this movie, so let me wrap it up. Unsurprisingly, this will be a polarizing movie - and hopefully, it will make money, because I like seeing a guy who works as hard as Zack Snyder does succeed, particularly with a project this insane. And here's the other point: this is a very easy movie to hate. There are elements in this movie that will either off as tasteless, shocking, or pointless to some, and they will piss people off to no end. And like I said, this is a movie that should have gone all-out for the R rating, and that it didn't is very disappointing for me. But overall, I actually really liked this movie. While the characters weren't at the level I was hoping, the action was great, the set pieces were fantastic, the CGI was very solid, the plot and style were both very nifty, and the soundtrack was fucking AMAZING.

Overall, I recommend you check this movie out. It's not as glorious as Watchmen, but it's still awesome.

 

Went to see this today, what a blast.

Parts of it were what one would get if you made anime real life. Mecha, panty shots, etc, etc.

My one regret was not getting to see Sweet Pea use what must've been a sweet claymore on her back.

I don't want to say more because it would all require spoiler tags. I could go watch it again tomorrow. It was a very sweet story and just a thrill otherwise.

And, man, the sound track blew my mind. I am buying it today if it's available.

 

FUCKING THESE TWO THINGS. Seriously. Every single dance sequence was basically two parts jizz one part tease: the soundtrack and action, jizz, me waiting patiently for Sweet Pea to whip out the longsword and go apeshit, fucking tease.

I'm seriously pissed about the sword. You don't just put that these without using. I bet she only uses it in some goddamn director's cut version which won't be here for months.

Also, I had one other thing that really niggled me. There was a dance sequence for each item. Except for the key and sacrifice. I am not okay with that. All I came to see were those dance sequences anyway. You're telling me they couldn't have done the escape in a dance sequence, like, the production or whatever filtering through the halls, and the sacrifice as some sort of hearing the music from within thing? I mean, it's not like

Spoiler

it wasn't all in Baby Doll's head anyway.

:/

Apart from that, eh. Having everything bumped up to R would have been nice, as was said. I mean, it was halfway there with all the t and a hanging out everywhere and rape insinuations and creepsauce orderlies. Might as well go the full monty.

 

^ All of the above. The soundtrack made the movie 10x more awesome.

Oh, and one last thing, let's hope that the Superman remake wont have the amount of slowmotion scenes this movie had.

 

There is talk that the cut dance sequences and other things that got toned down to make the PG-13 rating will be added back into the director's cut. Do want.

I saw it the other day and enjoyed it. Was it a good movie? Not necessarily. Was it entertaining? Yes - and at the end of the day, that's what matters more to me.

I think if/when a lot of the cut scenes get added back in, the quality of the movie will increase and it'll be a lot easier to follow, as well.

Spoiler

That said, Snyder could use a bit more subtlety in his foreshadowing. I don't know if it was due to poor editing, but you knew how half the scenes were going to end as soon as they started; the kitchen dance being the worst offender.

 

I expected to like this for the action sequences, but for it to really only be an alright movie. It was much, much better than I expected. For one thing, it was a lot less exploitative than I expected. I agree with what Silens Cursor seemed to be getting at. In a lot of ways, this is a chick flick. All the protagonists are female (and trying to escape from a bad man), the skimpy costumes feel more like a game of dress-up than pandering, and

Spoiler

the fight scenes are actually dance scenes?

I have to say, I never got all that invested in the characters. The acting and dialogue weren't great. Despite this, I started crying during the dressing room scene. I don't know if its that time of the month or something but oh yeah, bawling(quietly) in the middle of the theater. I haven't done that since I first saw Bambi.

And that ending. Like Shutter Island but they actually went there, and then made it worse. So yeah, this is worth seeing. It had some problems, but I hope it does well enough that more movies like it are made. Like all those Twilight spin-offs but good. And I hope girls go see this. I'm all for this being the new chick flick.

 

Seeing as several people have brought up similar points, I figured I may as well link to MovieBob's review.

I'd planned to see this with a few friends this Sunday, but there were some unfortunate last minute cancellations, so I'll probably be seeing it this weekend. I'm glad to see that it's been received fairly positively by people with similar tastes to mine.

 

I went to see it the day before yesterday. Awesome movie, visually. A female friend of mine didn't like it though - and she's really one of those Twilight chicks.

Seems to me that women don't like movies in which they are strong and prefer those where they are weak-minded and dominated by vampires and werewolves. Such irony when men end up being more feminist than women.

Oh, and the soundtrack is awesome. I didn't realize at the time that some actors are actually singing most of those songs/covers. "Where is My Mind" by Yoav/Emily Browning is pretty good. And so are others.

 

Only the retarded ones. I much prefer the Sucker Punch vision of women to the Twilight one, thanks all the same. And I am female.

I saw this a few days ago and loved it. As has been mentioned, the dialogue and acting could have been improved to make you connect better with the characters, but the action sequences, music, and overall visuals more than made up for it. It's something a bit different than the norm, and I liked the concept of it.