I have to admit, I’m rather puzzled as to the original meaning of, not the first ‘Dude’, but the parenthetical following it. Unless you were specifically meaning to underscore your belief in Chapulin’s masculinity, then just what was that there for?
It was there because I thought she was a dude? Is this really so hard to understand? Still doesn’t require the shock and awe it generated.
I’ve only seen mention of a single sex scene being removed, in which case I wouldn’t consider it that big a loss.
I loved both 300 and Watchmen, so I’m very much looking forward to Sucker Punch and will probably see it tomorrow. Almost everything about the trailer screams “awesome,” including the two music choices.
The only thing from the trailer I don’t like is Scott Glenn’s delivery, which sounds oddly wooden for an actor of his credentials. But I don’t care; I’m still seeing it.
Did you come from the IMDB forums?
Welcome to the SDMB, Chapulin. We have a rule against insulting other members, so please don’t.
Thanks,
twickster, Cafe Society moderator
Hm. The first reviews are up, and… they’re not good.
Wait for DVD? >.>
Never mind the DVD – the real entertainment in these cases is provided by the more delightfully caustic critics:
Ouch.
What in the world would a nazi robot dinosaur do with a katana?!
Well… fuck. How could Snyder manage to screw this up?
I gather that the problem was that instead of coming up with a simple pulpy plot that served as a thin but adequate framework from which to hang the kewl scenes (a la Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow), he served up an overwrought confusing frame story that clashed horribly with the popcorn-fun elements.
The girlfriend and I watched it last night. Silly as all fuck, but we both enjoyed it.
I didn’t think I was the target demographic for this film, and the reviews confirm that. I am not of the video game generation, and therefore do not instinctively accept a re-created game sequence as being a storytelling technique, despite kewl visuals.
A shame really – if they stuck to tried and true comic book style exposition it might have worked (but as I said, the marketers are no longer targeting my money, so the point is moot).
I don’t think that’s it. I think the problem was more that Zack Snyder makes movies by coming up with a bunch of cool shots and “awesome” setpieces (or, in the cases of “300” and “Watchmen,” lifts them wholesale from the source material), and then proceeds to film them and vomit the result onto the screen without ever once thinking about story, or character, or pacing, or themes, or editing.
He’s the ADD-est of the ADD generation of directors, the comic-obsessed offspring of Michael Bay and Roland Emmerich.
From the Chicago Tribune’s Michael Phillips (as part of a zero-star review):
“‘Sucker Punch’ is certainly the strangest dance musical of all time. Each time the female protagonist goes into her bump-and-grind, the routine is depicted as a video gamer’s fantasy of violent combat against zombie Germans in World War I, or cyborgs, or dragons. It’s like Roxie Hart of ‘Chicago’ ran off for the weekend with some pimply adolescent Xbox fiend.”
I think that’s just a different way of saying the same thing – left to his own devices to actually create a story from which to hang his setpieces (rather than adapting an existing one), he whiffed, badly.
Well, here’s a mostly positive review to balance all the negative. I was actually expecting a negative review from Katherine Monk when I opened the paper this morning based on percieved demographics alone.
http://www.canada.com/entertainment/movie-guide/Review+Sucker+Punch/4498482/story.html
Probably a bluray viewing for me, but I still want to see it. Prob has lot’s of shit blowing up.
Definitely true. I guess I interpreted your post as suggesting that with a simpler plot, “Sucker Punch” might have been successful, and that the fault lay in Snyder’s overcomplication of the story. My point was more that it doesn’t matter whether the plot is simple or ridiculously circuitous, but rather that the writer/director has to give more than a moment’s thought to its execution. It’s absolutely possible to make a great action movie with a dense plot and complex world-building (just look at “Inception”), but you need to have filmmakers who care as much about the story and characters as they do about CGI masturbation.
Unfortunately, it’s mostly positive for Sucker Punch’s feminist message, where “feminist” apparently translates to “women can’t have nice things”.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but wouldn’t the feminism be the actions she takes to rectify that problem?