GeneR777

SOME SPOILERS(?) Not really... (But DO stay for after the credits!)

It is quite possible to love Captain America the comic book too much. It is also quite possible to love those trailers with Stanley Tucci as Dr Erskine telling skinny Chris Evans / Steve Rogers that "It's about being a good man."

And it is quite possible to get entranced by the humility and guts of this young man who would do good. Because at the heart of this comic book hero is a story about a good, pure- hearted man who would do whatever he could to do the right thing... and keep getting back up when bigger and more capable men would have long given up.

And that is touching.

And for the first half of the movie the story touches this admirably. My only beef is with the second half which seems to ditch the brooding character development of what is essentially a gentle and loving soul learning to finally enjoy his life... and gets too much into the action.

Now, GRANTED, this IS a comic book movie. And GRANTED, this is also an action adventure story.

But the spine of the story as portrayed in the first half of the story should have played a more central role in the second half. I think that would have made this into a "perfect" super hero movie... but moreso a solid, and touching drama.

Because at the heart of this story SHOULD have been about a good man, learning his self- worth, and the love of a good woman who would inspire him to move forward even when he far outlived her.

THAT, would have made the story thematically and emotionally unified. So maybe if the story was 30 minutes longer with that aspect of the drama placed within the heart of the story I would not have felt so numb and let down in the second half.

Maybe. Maybe not.

Just one other point: This movie is MEANT to be a setup for next year's AVENGERS movie. It would be a serious waste if they stopped making Captain America movies just to focus on Avengers stories. At the heart is still a man who is discovering his own self-worth. And that is plenty important in this day and age.

I originally wrote a review the day after I saw Sucker Punch. I panned it. To me my initial feelings were rather lukewarm at best.

But then I gave it some time.

And as I went through my days afterward my mind would wander back to the story and think about the visual food for thought.

Yeah, the girls are hot. Yeah, the action is over the top, but if you look at the emotional landscape that is being explored in a more literal fashion via the action then yeah, this is a pretty cool idea.

Sometimes films come along that are a "sucker punch" in terms of originality. The general public usually reacts negatively to it which leads to poor box office results. But later on the audience has had a chance to digest what was given and revisits the film and breaths new life into it.

My prediction is that such a situation will happen with Sucker Punch. It'll probably not recoup its initial budget at the box office. People will flood the IMDb forum with reasons why it did not work. We will probably see about a few dozen threads at least where people will vent their reasons why they hate the film and why you too should not see it.

But given some time it will recoup via video sales and other distribution deals.

Why?

Because it's still a solid story. The style of the movie is an Otaku's wet dream, but overall result is still the same: it does surprise and give ample food for thought.

Think of it as stylized parable about repression, personal will and sacrifice. Because sooner or later after all the negative backlash and reviews blow by those emotional messages will be all that will be left.

And people will remember it for that reason.

Well, if anyone has ever seen the original Tron, you would know that there is quite a lot of inventiveness for that time period. That was back in 1980-1982 when they were making the first film. To put some perspective of how inventive TRON was for the time think back and remember that the first Macintosh computer was still just a project back at Apple, video games were mostly those sold on Atari cartridges.

So the visuals at that time were mind-blowing to say the least. And if you watch it now and can understand what it meant at the time, yeah, it's still pretty impressive.

But that was 1982.

Almost 30 years later we have this legacy film. And guess what? It has a lot of the same stuff we saw in the first film. And that is almost a given because people loved the original because of the lightcycles, the grid, etc. So it is almost a given that you have to have them in the film.

Well, if you take this film as a paint by numbers a la Hollywood style, then we have the following: 1.) The obligatory homage of lightcycles, light tanks, light whatever-those-red-flying- things-are-called-with-the-long-arms. 2.) You have the obligatory introduction of the new world. 3.) You have the obligatory sexy chicks. Come on. If you're shaking your head on this, think about it: you still have to appeal to the teenage boys and above. 4.) You have the obligatory guy-girl relationship. 5.) You have the conflict between antagonist and protagonist. Build it within a three act structure where the resolution of the story comes with a struggle between the two main forces leading to a resolution. Check.

Okay, so what's really left then? We top out at a little over two hours I believe. That's just about all you can really do in that much time.

So bearing that, people might ask: why isn't it more innovative? Why is it staying too close to the source material?

Well, there's a good reason: Because TRON was a cult film for certain reasons. You can innovate but you have to be true to the source material which is the core reason for any sort of fan base.

So, overall I thought it was decent. Some of the gladiator stuff I had to say was pretty cool. I liked the hot siren, and (of course) Olivia Wilde. But otherwise it was what I expected. Nothing terribly innovative. But heck, I still got my money's worth.