Sucker Punch
I made myself a couple of Sucker Punch icons, in part because I think it is possibly the most UNDERRATED movie I have EVER seen (I can't think why you'd want them, but they are shareable if you do). I spent a lot of this weekend reading reviews and being BAFFLED by them. And it hurts my soul because I think that it was ultimately a careful and vivid exploration of trauma and the effects of rape culture.
So as not to spoil the plot (which is complex and worth paying attention to), I'm going to talk to you about clothes. This doesn't come out of nowhere, as a lot of the reviews/comments I've read have amounted to, "THEY ARE WEARING SHORT SKIRTS. THAT IS EXPLOITATION. THAT IS TERRIBLE." Which does not do the movie justice at all.
The setting of Sucker Punch is three layers of reality: A. a mental institution (more or less the real world), B. a brothel (a metaphor for the mental institution), and C. a series of fantasy fight settings.
On level A, we see female characters outside the institution wearing normal clothes that cover all the parts reviewers presumably expect women to have covered in order to be taken seriously as characters (legs are apparently important here). In the asylum they wear short uniforms that explicitly allow male attendants/staff access to their bodies, and are also not seen very much because we spend a large percentage of our time...
On level B, where female characters are forced into sexy dancing and prostitution, and wear heels and leotards, low-cut tops and fishnets. They are even more obviously objectified here, prettied up for the pleasure of customers (who are largely unseen) and staff, who are shown watching them throughout the movie. It is clearly stated that their costumes are chosen for them, that male characters may choose to manipulate them, and that the girls' agency is limited, even though the brothel is ostensibly a fantasy. (This is something else I find problematic in many reviews: the fact that the fantasy of the brothel is overlaid on the reality of the institution doesn't mean it is BETTER or MORE DESIRABLE. It just makes even more explicit the sexism and objectification the characters face in the real world.)
On level C, by contrast, the characters are kicking the asses of various CG beasties. The costumes are sexy, but they are completely controlled by the characters themselves because this is the fantasy that IS better and more desirable. Here's how I know. I read a lot of comic books for my job, largely undergrounds from the '60s, though I am not totally unfamiliar with mainstream comics of various pedigrees (although my knowledge of manga is almost nil). When a hot girl in a comic gets into a fight, she is likely to start out in whatever the comic's version of fully clothed is, every hair in place and weapons at the ready. She is likely to end the fight with some part of her clothing ripped, burned, or inexplicably absent in a way that exposes her breasts/thighs/stomach/ass. She is subject to threats of sexual violence in addition to punches, kicks, bullets, and knives, a constant reminder of her permeability, the possibility of entry into her body. And perhaps most importantly she is subject to a (male) viewership that, however much it wants to see her win the fight, also wants to see her tits. Sucker Punch's level C is different. The girls are impermeable on this level. They fight as hard as they can, and it is their enemies and the terrain that take the beating. Their clothes remain intact and they remain uninjured. It is nothing short of total bodily autonomy. They are thrown into walls, shot at, and cornered in trenches, but their enemies are never sexually threatening. The nature of the assault is re-imagined, externalized so that it can be dealt with simply and directly in a way the insidious sexual threat of the real world never could be.
Rape culture means that a woman in a short skirt will be told she is asking for it, and the poison of that thought is inescapable in our society, even though we fight it, even though we try to expose it for what it is and take away its power. But this movie is about living in that culture, enduring it and fantasizing about the place where your short skirt is yours and you have the inalienable right to wear it without having to consider if it makes you a target for sexual assault, if it makes you a weaker fighter, if it makes you less of a feminist. I think that's a powerful contrast for an action movie -- hell, any movie -- to make.
If you are considering seeing Sucker Punch, please consider your own triggers and boundaries. Levels A and B are ugly, and while that makes them powerful, it also makes them deeply upsetting.
So as not to spoil the plot (which is complex and worth paying attention to), I'm going to talk to you about clothes. This doesn't come out of nowhere, as a lot of the reviews/comments I've read have amounted to, "THEY ARE WEARING SHORT SKIRTS. THAT IS EXPLOITATION. THAT IS TERRIBLE." Which does not do the movie justice at all.
The setting of Sucker Punch is three layers of reality: A. a mental institution (more or less the real world), B. a brothel (a metaphor for the mental institution), and C. a series of fantasy fight settings.
On level A, we see female characters outside the institution wearing normal clothes that cover all the parts reviewers presumably expect women to have covered in order to be taken seriously as characters (legs are apparently important here). In the asylum they wear short uniforms that explicitly allow male attendants/staff access to their bodies, and are also not seen very much because we spend a large percentage of our time...
On level B, where female characters are forced into sexy dancing and prostitution, and wear heels and leotards, low-cut tops and fishnets. They are even more obviously objectified here, prettied up for the pleasure of customers (who are largely unseen) and staff, who are shown watching them throughout the movie. It is clearly stated that their costumes are chosen for them, that male characters may choose to manipulate them, and that the girls' agency is limited, even though the brothel is ostensibly a fantasy. (This is something else I find problematic in many reviews: the fact that the fantasy of the brothel is overlaid on the reality of the institution doesn't mean it is BETTER or MORE DESIRABLE. It just makes even more explicit the sexism and objectification the characters face in the real world.)
On level C, by contrast, the characters are kicking the asses of various CG beasties. The costumes are sexy, but they are completely controlled by the characters themselves because this is the fantasy that IS better and more desirable. Here's how I know. I read a lot of comic books for my job, largely undergrounds from the '60s, though I am not totally unfamiliar with mainstream comics of various pedigrees (although my knowledge of manga is almost nil). When a hot girl in a comic gets into a fight, she is likely to start out in whatever the comic's version of fully clothed is, every hair in place and weapons at the ready. She is likely to end the fight with some part of her clothing ripped, burned, or inexplicably absent in a way that exposes her breasts/thighs/stomach/ass. She is subject to threats of sexual violence in addition to punches, kicks, bullets, and knives, a constant reminder of her permeability, the possibility of entry into her body. And perhaps most importantly she is subject to a (male) viewership that, however much it wants to see her win the fight, also wants to see her tits. Sucker Punch's level C is different. The girls are impermeable on this level. They fight as hard as they can, and it is their enemies and the terrain that take the beating. Their clothes remain intact and they remain uninjured. It is nothing short of total bodily autonomy. They are thrown into walls, shot at, and cornered in trenches, but their enemies are never sexually threatening. The nature of the assault is re-imagined, externalized so that it can be dealt with simply and directly in a way the insidious sexual threat of the real world never could be.
Rape culture means that a woman in a short skirt will be told she is asking for it, and the poison of that thought is inescapable in our society, even though we fight it, even though we try to expose it for what it is and take away its power. But this movie is about living in that culture, enduring it and fantasizing about the place where your short skirt is yours and you have the inalienable right to wear it without having to consider if it makes you a target for sexual assault, if it makes you a weaker fighter, if it makes you less of a feminist. I think that's a powerful contrast for an action movie -- hell, any movie -- to make.
If you are considering seeing Sucker Punch, please consider your own triggers and boundaries. Levels A and B are ugly, and while that makes them powerful, it also makes them deeply upsetting.