Emily Browning

SLEEPING BEAUTY Review

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: December 1st, 2011 at 2:45 pm

[This is a reprint of my review from the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival. Sleeping Beauty opens tomorrow in limited release.]

Julia Leigh’s Sleeping Beauty invites us into a world which unintentionally undoes its own effect. Ordinarily, the sex acts and humiliation would shock us, but we’re asked to accept a reality in which every character passively accepts these depraved circumstances. The characters have perfectly justifiable reasons for their detachment but their ennui carries over to the audience due to Leigh’s sparse approach, seductive visuals, and Emily Browning’s brave but withdrawn performance. We become numb like the film’s protagonist and we disconnect from any emotional attachment.

New Trailer for SLEEPING BEAUTY Starring Emily Browning

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: October 12th, 2011 at 2:25 pm

A new trailer has gone online for Julia Leigh’s psychosexual drama Sleeping Beauty.  Emily Browning (Sucker Punch) stars as a young woman who becomes a prostitute offering a highly-specified fetish for high-paying clients.  The trailer is a bit misleading as it sets the movie up as more of a thriller with an underlying sense of danger.  As I said in my review, the film numbs you into feeling the ennui and detachment of the protagonist and the cinematography, while gorgeous, is meant to reflect that detachment and beauty of Browning’s character.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  Sleeping Beauty opens in limited release on December 2nd.

TIFF 2011: SLEEPING BEAUTY Review

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: September 13th, 2011 at 4:21 pm

Julia Leigh’s Sleeping Beauty invites us into a world which unintentionally undoes its own effect.  Ordinarily, the sex acts and humiliation would shock us, but we’re asked to accept a reality in which every character passively accepts these depraved circumstances.  The characters have perfectly justifiable reasons for their detachment but their ennui carries over to the audience due to Leigh’s sparse approach, seductive visuals, and Emily Browning’s brave but withdrawn performance.  We become numb like the film’s protagonist and we disconnect from any emotional attachment.

SUCKER PUNCH Blu-ray Review

by Andre Dellamorte    Posted: July 4th, 2011 at 5:15 pm

Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch hit theaters in March earlier this year, but it’s road to theaters felt like watching a train hit the emergency break. The year before it came out, the film wowed comic-con audiences, and Warner Brothers had set visits – Snyder was still seen as a wonder boy, even if Watchmen didn’t take it home. But by the week of release, Warners couldn’t hold it in the bag: Sucker Punch is a weird movie that doesn’t totally work for a number of reasons.

It’s one of the great “I made a big hit movie, I’m going to go make my art” films that fails in interesting ways. And now there’s a director’s cut, which hopes to solve some of those problems. Emily Browning plays Babydoll, a girl with a traumatic past who’s put in an insane asylum with a bunch of other girls, and leads a fantasy life that transposes her inmates and doctors into dancers and pimps. My review of the Blu-ray and director’s cut of Sucker Punch follow after the jump.

NSFW Trailer and Image for Cannes’ Selection SLEEPING BEAUTY Starring Emily Browning

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: April 14th, 2011 at 8:21 am

As we just reported, the selections for this year’s Cannes Film Festival have been announced.  Among this year’s selections is Julia Leigh’s dark psychosexual drama Sleeping Beauty.  How dark is the film?  Well here’s what he heard the synopsis was last year: “a haunting erotic fairy tale about a student who drifts into prostitution and finds her niche as a woman who sleeps, drugged, in a ‘Sleeping Beauty chamber’ while men do to her what she can’t remember the next morning.”

The trailer has some striking imagery and I’m intrigued by the unnerving premise.  Hit the jump to check out the trailer along with some images from the film.  The 2011 Cannes Film Festival runs from May 11 – 22nd.

SUCKER PUNCH Premiere Celebrity Images

by Christina Radish    Posted: March 25th, 2011 at 8:49 am

For the premiere of Zack Snyder’s fantasy thriller Sucker Punch, the stars of the film gathered under a tent housing the black carpet, in order to escape the rain and keep their gowns dry. The film’s leading ladies – Emily Browning, Vanessa Hudgens, Abbie Cornish, Jena Malone and Jamie Chung – were ultra-glam, as they came out to support the Watchmen and 300 director, who will next be taking on Superman: Man of Steel.

Joining the film’s main cast, co-stars Carla Gugino, Jon Hamm, Scott Glenn and Oscar Isaac, mingled at the Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood with Watchmen star Malin Akerman, Diane Lane (seen next as Martha Kent), Red Riding Hood star Max Irons, Scream 4 star Emma Roberts and Juno Temple, who will be in The Dark Knight Rises. Check out all of the exclusive photos after the jump:

SUCKER PUNCH Review

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: March 24th, 2011 at 3:09 pm

Imagination does not exist in a vacuum.  We’re inspired by experiences both internal and external.  We build our dreams on the dreams of others and if we possess a brilliant imagination, then we can transform these ideas into something fresh and new.  With his new film Sucker Punch, director Zack Snyder shows he not only misunderstands how imagination works, he also has no understanding of inspiration, empowerment, or joy.  The movie swims through the wet dreams of a teenage boy but pretends at higher aspirations of thoughtful escapism and transcendent determination.  For a movie where dragons battle fighter jets and teenage girls in skimpy outfits take down samurai golems, Sucker Punch is a surprisingly dull and self-serious affair that can’t be bothered to develop its heroine, but wants a round of applause every time she defeats a CGI monstrosity.  Despite all of the energy put into the stunning vistas and designs, nothing in Sucker Punch‘s visuals comes close to the majesty of its delusions of grandeur.

Emily Browning and Abbie Cornish Exclusive Video Interview SUCKER PUNCH

by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub    Posted: March 20th, 2011 at 9:15 pm

With director Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch opening next weekend, I got to sit down with most of the cast yesterday.  As the synopsis says, Sucker Punch is an “epic action fantasy that takes us into the vivid imagination of a young girl whose dream world provides the ultimate escape from her darker reality. Unrestrained by the boundaries of time and place, she is free to go where her mind takes her, and her incredible adventures blur the lines between what’s real and what is imaginary.” The film stars Emily Browning, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, Jamie Chung, Jena Malone, Carla Gugino, Jon Hamm, Scott Glenn, and Oscar Isaac.

During my interview with Browning and Cornish, we talked about how everyone bonded off set while they filmed in Vancouver, their reaction to seeing the finished film, the many deleted scenes and will they be in a director’s cut (they will), and what is their go to karaoke song.  Hit the jump to watch and look for a new video interview for Sucker Punch everyday this week.

5 Movie Clips from Zack Snyder’s SUCKER PUNCH

by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub    Posted: March 18th, 2011 at 6:49 pm

Warner Bros. has released five movie clips Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch which stars Emily Browning, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, Jamie Chung, Jena Malone, Carla Gugino, Jon Hamm, Scott Glenn, and Oscar Isaac.  Sucker Punch is an “epic action fantasy that takes us into the vivid imagination of a young girl whose dream world provides the ultimate escape from her darker reality. Unrestrained by the boundaries of time and place, she is free to go where her mind takes her, and her incredible adventures blur the lines between what’s real and what is imaginary.”  Hit the jump to watch the clips and look for our exclusive video interviews with the cast next week.

45 High Resolution Images from Zack Snyder’s SUCKER PUNCH

by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub    Posted: March 14th, 2011 at 12:26 pm

Warner Bros. has released the full press kit for Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch.  Included are 45 high resolution images of Emily Browning, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, Jamie Chung, Jena Malone, Carla Gugino, Jon Hamm, Scott Glenn, and Oscar Isaac.  Many of the images are new.  Sucker Punch opens March 25th.  Check them out after the jump:

Emily Browning On Set Interview SUCKER PUNCH

by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub    Posted: March 1st, 2011 at 11:01 am

With writer-director Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch getting released in less than a month (March 25), Warner Bros. has finally lifted my embargo and after the jump you can either read or listen to the on set interview I did with Emily Browning.  As the star of Snyder’s crazy new film, Browning talked about how she bonded with the rest of the cast (Vanessa Hudgens, Jena Malone, Jamie Chung, Abbie Cornish), what it was like to act in several different levels of fantasy on top of all of the physical requirements of the role, the huge action set pieces, and so much more.  Like I said in my set report, if you’re a fan of Zack Snyder – especially Zack Snyder’s action sequences – you’re going to absolutely love what he has in store for Sucker Punch.

SUCKER PUNCH Set Visit

by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub    Posted: March 1st, 2011 at 11:00 am

Jena Malone is practicing her musical number.  Abbie Cornish and Jamie Chung are preparing to fight crazy-looking soldiers in a German trench during World War I.  Emily Browning is going to attack a huge red dragon.  And this is just the tip of the iceberg of Sucker Punch.

It’s November 24^th, 2009 and I’m on a plane leaving Vancouver bound for Los Angeles.  I spent all day yesterday on the set of writer-director Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch and came away extremely impressed by the vision and scope of his 5th feature film.  While his previous two films (300 and Watchmen) have been both applauded and derided by how they reflect the source material, Sucker Punch is Snyder’s first foray into having complete freedom to tell a story without having to work within the confines of a pre-established universe.  And while I loved his last two films, I feel like this is the one that’s going to really capture everything Snyder has learned over the past several years. The movie looks fiercely original and unlike anything Hollywood has ever released.  It features an almost all girl cast and they’re fighting as hard as the men of 300.

Like the Watchmen set visit, Snyder gave us a ton of freedom on set and let us see everything he has in store for audiences on March 25th.  For a complete report of my experience, hit the jump.

SUCKER PUNCH Soundtrack Releases March 22nd; Features Songs from Emily Browning and Carla Gugino

by Jason Barr    Posted: February 24th, 2011 at 6:53 pm

Just in time for the film’s March 25th theatrical release, the soundtrack for writer/director Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch will be released on Tuesday, March 22nd. Per the press release, the soundtrack will be comprised of “fascinatingly reworked versions of classic songs” i.e. star Emily Browning performing Eurythmics mainstay “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This).” Browning isn’t the only cast member lending her pipes to the soundtrack as Carla Gugino and Oscar Isaac also perform a duet of Roxy Music’s “Love Is the Drug.” After checking out the track listing for the soundtrack, I have to say I’m interested in seeing how the songs interact with the mildly insane imagery we’ve seen from the film thus far. Given that it features a giant robot bunny, not too mention a soundtrack with songs by members of the cast, I wouldn’t be surprised if a musical number popped up at some point.

To check out the full press release (which features the aforementioned full track listing), hit the jump. In addition to Browning, Gugino, and Isaac, Sucker Punch also stars Abbie Cornish, Jena Malone, Jamie Chung, Vanessa Hudgens, Jon Hamm, and Scott Glenn. To catch up on all of our previous Sucker Punch coverage, click here.

New Retro Posters for SUCKER PUNCH

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: February 24th, 2011 at 8:10 am

Since Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch is set during the 1950s, it’s only proper that the film should get some retro-style posters.  They’re not as impressive as the retro posters for last year’s Kick-Ass, but they’re still eye-catching.  Then again, so is most of the Sucker Punch marketing since it’s relying on the sex appeal of its cast and the large weapons they’re wielding.

Hit the jump to check out the posters.  Sucker Punch stars Emily Browning, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, Jamie Chung, Jena Malone, Carla Gugino, Jon Hamm, Scott Glenn, and Oscar Isaac.  The film opens March 25th.

Five New SUCKER PUNCH Character Posters

by Jason Barr    Posted: January 24th, 2011 at 4:48 pm

With its release just over two months away, Warner Bros. has revealed five new character posters to promote Sucker Punch.  Written/directed by Zack Snyder, Sucker Punch tells the story of a young girl (Emily Browning) who, when sent to an insane asylum, embarks on a journey to freedom that consistently blurs the line between real and imaginary.  In addition to Browning, Sucker Punch also stars Vanessa Hudgens, Jena Malone, Jamie Chung, Abbie Cornish, Carla Gugino, and Jon Hamm.  The film hits theaters on March 25th.

To become better acquainted with Sucker Punch‘s five heavily-armed females, hit the jump.  To catch up on all of our previous Sucker Punch coverage, click here.

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