No two ways about it - there has never been another film quite like Sucker Punch. However, it may be that there's a very good reason for this. In his only film to date made from a concept of his own creation, Snyder really goes all out, throwing together elements of steampunk, Dungeons & Dragons, Manga, burlesque and more besides in a delirious, bullet-riddled, big screen fantasia. This alone, I suspect, would have been fine. However, to justify this hyper-stylised spectacle, the director (and, in this instance, co-writer) frames the fan-pleasing action sequences around a story of young women in a mental institute, imagining they are dancing girls in a brothel, imagining they are mighty warriors in a Metal Hurlant dreamworld - and, in all three worlds, desperate to find their freedom. Perhaps Snyder was sincere in his desire to tell an empowering story of subjugated, objectified women fighting back against male oppression. Yet in trying to marry his fetishistic vision with a feminist backbone, it rather feels like he's trying to have his cake and eat it too - and a ridiculously over-sized, heavily decorated cake at that. Worst crime of all, though - and this is a complaint which can be made of all Snyder's films - is that Sucker Punch reeks of believing itself to be so much more intelligent and sophisticated than it really is. From its obtuse title to the fractured levels of fantasy (even the initial 'real' world is clearly not-quite real), the whole endeavour is weighed down in ostentatious symbolism, pointing toward some profound message which I remain unconvinced is really there. But again - there's no denying that Sucker Punch is a truly unique film that looks great and it is intermittently entertaining, if purely on a visceral level. For better or worse, it is surely to Snyder's credit that he was able to get something so unorthodox made on a blockbuster budget in today's infamously risk-averse cinematic climate.