SUCKER PUNCH

Director: Jack Snyder

Starring: Emily Browning, Abbie Cornish, Jena Malone, Vanessa Hudgens, Jamie Chung

IF EVER there was a film that splits an audience, this is it.

If you’ve seen director Zack Snyder’s films 300 and Watchmen and enjoyed them then you’ll possibly be happy with Sucker Punch.

Others will loathe it and indeed half a dozen people walked out of the screening I was at.

For some unknown reason I quite enjoyed it.

If you dismiss the film’s rather pretentious philosophical stance then you’re left with an action/thriller movie that is really a graphic novel on a film screen.

The story is about ‘Baby Doll’ (Browning, the eldest child in Lemony Snickett) who, following her mother’s death, is thrown into an asylum by her unpleasant step-father and faces a lobotomy in five days’ time.

Naturally, her priority is to escape, but at this stage the audience is taken on a trip of varying levels of imagination.

We move to a seedy dance club where Baby Doll and a group of fellow ‘dancers’ want to escape, but in order to do so our hero has to strut her stuff which magically takes us to another dimension.

Confused? Well, the best thing is just to sit back and enjoy the amazing fight scenes that involve dragons, giant ancient Japanese warriors and even dead second world war Germans operating through a combination of clockwork and steam.

Browning is spot on for the role and while no-one is likely to be considered for an acting award, they all are competent enough. It’s also got some superb music.

I fancy the DVD will sell better than tickets to see this movie. The heavy criticism might just persuade many not to bother.

three out of five stars

Steve Payne

Screening courtesy of Cineworld Crawley