Zack Snyder is gearing up for his upcoming Netflix release, Rebel Moon, but he’s reflecting on his past work. Speaking with Letterboxd, Snyder talked about the 2011 action film Sucker Punch. Sitting at 22% on Rotten Tomatoes, the film saw immense backlash at the film and barely got the usual “critical reevaluation” most cult classics from that time have.
Snyder spoke about the film and its backlash during the interview, getting candid about the reception, stating: “I feel like the main criticism of the film was that it was too exploitative,” Snyder said. “People took the movie as if the girls fighting and all that stuff was the movie. I found that slightly disheartening.” The filmmaker recalls the film as being “so genre self-aware.”
Speaking of that awareness, Snyder wanted to ensure that the film’s tone was a “self-aware, self-reflexive audience observing the movie.” He adds, “It’s talking directly to them about what they wanna see. They wanna see the girls; they don’t wanna see the girls empowered. They wanna see them in sexy outfits. That was the whole thing to me; I always thought it was interesting when people would review the movie and say it’s exploitative. It’s like an anti-war movie that gets the war too good.”
Snyder notes who Sucker Punch seems to work for. “It was a very polarizing film,” Snyder said. “To be frank, the people I’ve run across who’ve come to me and said ‘Sucker Punch is my favorite movie’ are normally angsty teenage girls. It’s like a Morrissey song or something.”
On the idea of a director’s cut, Snyder is enthusiastic. He notes, “You’ll get to see it at some point, I’m sure. I hope… I’ve never gotten around to doing the director’s cut. I still plan to at some point. But in the original ending, when Babydoll is in the chair in the basement with Blue — she’s already been lobotomized — when the cop shines the light on her, the set breaks apart, and she stands up and sings a song on stage.”
“She sings, ‘Ooh, Child, things are gonna get easier,'” Snyder continued. “Blondie, and all the people that have been killed, join in, and it’s the idea that in a weird way, even though she’s lobotomized, she’s kind of stuck in this infinite loop of euphoric victory. It’s weirdly not optimistic and optimistic at the same time. That’s kind of what the tone was at the end. We tested it, and the studio thought it was too weird, so we changed it.”
Sucker Punch is celebrating its 20th anniversary by screening at New York City’s IFC Center. Let us know what you make of the film, and whether you’d be interested in seeing Snyder’s Director’s Cut…
Originally published August 2, 2023. Updated August 3, 2023.
