Say what you want, but I loved it.

Rating: Null/10 (4 August 2012)

I want to start out by saying that this is hardly a 10/10 film. If you really want to look at the flaws, and the details, and all that, a 7 might be more fair. But, for whatever reason, I just loved this movie. So much so that I can forgive its flaws.
I'll get the issues out of the way first. The script. It's a bit messy, and there are more than a few bad lines. Also, two of the characters- Amber and Blondie- don't really have any place in the film, apart from giving us a really, really good scene towards the end (I won't give it away). Most (not quite all, but I won't name names) of the cast- particularly Oscar Isaac, Carla Gugino and Jena Malone- is great. The characters are a bit underdeveloped, and I would have liked to see more interaction between the girls, and some more background for each of them. Now onto the good.
This is a Zack Snyder movie. That much is very clear in every single frame. The saturated colors and stylized look are breathtaking, and the attention paid to detail (if you look closely, you'll see that the protagonist's entire story is engraved onto her sword) is remarkable. The music, as many others have said, feels like a character in the film. Each track is perfectly chosen, and it pulls us in and out of different levels of Babydoll's fantasy seamlessly. The CGI landscapes are beautiful and detailed, and the fight choreography is simply spectacular. It's like watching an intricate and well-oiled machine go to work. I had to just sit back and marvel at it all.
From the opening scene, where the camera flies through about five minutes of powerful, non-verbal storytelling, I was hooked. It's a great movie to just lose yourself in. After several viewings, it becomes evident that Sucker Punch is actually a good bit smarter than you'd expect. There are lots of Buddhist themes- the whole premise of the movie is the pursuit of true freedom, whatever that may be, and what it takes to find it. The action sequences are like meditation, as Babydoll learns to control her mind and defeat her personal demons (which appear in the forms of zombies, dragons, and robots, among other things.) Towards the end of each sequence, Babydoll seems to gain supernatural powers, as she pulls off something fantastic- because she has, after all, mastered her own mind. There's also some clever social satire. The advertisements tried to bring people in with scantily clad girls beating the crap out of monsters. In the beginning, we see one of these scantily clad girls as she loses her mother, her sister, is almost raped by her stepfather, is sent to a mental institution, and, right as she's about to be lobotomized, another character literally stands up and yells "STOP! This is a joke, right? I get the sexy little school girl. I even get the helpless mental patient; that can be hot. But what is this? Lobotomized vegetable? Why don't we try something a bit more commercial?" There's the sucker punch. It didn't play by the rules. A big theme of the film is the objectification of women. Towards the end, when SPOILER ALERT the villain succeeds in 'objectifying' a girl by lobotomizing her (turning her into a flesh-and-blood 'babydoll', he doesn't want her any more, because he's lost "that undeniable spark that is you." END SPOILERS
It's a guilty pleasure, pure and simple, but one with some very interesting themes. The critical bashing was more than unfair. Sucker Punch is spectacular, thrilling, breathtaking, beautiful, intense, and- most unexpectedly- emotionally involving. You'll love it or you'll hate it. Try to guess which category I fall under. 10/10.