Reviewed By Steve Kochems
I don't think people really believe me when I tell them some of the assignments I get in school. I'm doing a philosophy project out of Lego's. I got to play ping pong with my favorite author last month. And last week I had to watch Sin City. School is tough.
I honestly tried to not like this movie. And it’s the fault of fan boys who praise it as the God of all movies, but they probably don’t even understand why it’s good; It is very good. This is in part to the fact that the author of the graphic novel, Frank Miller, was brought on as co-director. He and Robert Rodriguez (Machete, Planet Terror) used the novel as a storyboard and adapt it nearly shot-for-shot. So in turn, the graphic novel is probably quite good. But there are things out of the ordinary at work in this story that make it a refreshing film to watch.
First off, it breaks the traditional plot structure that a film will use and replaces it with two mini stories and another framed around those two. Marv (Mickey Rourke), a brute, Dwight (Clive Owen), a crafty assassin, and Hartigan (Bruce Willis), a gunned down cop, all get their own little story and each is paired with an equally strong female, which I’ll get to in a minute. I noticed that each of their journeys that we see is driven by a simple motive evoked by some dick character. Marv is fueled by revenge, Dwight seeks to maintain independence for the girls of Sin City, and Hartigan is driven by love in its purest form. While the stories don’t completely intertwine, they each stand on their own with subtle hints at one another. The best use of this is when we get a quick shot of Marv at the end of the film when following Hartigan. It might be the best shot of the film because it says so much with so little, Marv being driven too far by his need to avenge a lover certainly deserves what he gets at the finale of his story, but when we see him later it’s before any of that happens. And even though we know his eventual fate, at that point he is just sitting in the bar having a drink with a smile on his face.
This is certainly the best adaptation of a comic or graphic novel because of how literally it is translated from the page. The cinematography is an outstanding representation of Miller’s novel. From the slight additions of color to the primarily black and white setting (clear representation of the polarized good and evil of the narrative) to the artistic contrast, most notably in Hartigan’s final scene, of each shot, Sin City really blew me away with its look alone.
Now, in a film where most of the women are dancers or prostitutes, I think that it has some of the strongest representations of females. Jessica Alba’s innocent Nancy grows before us from an innocent young girl to a strong woman that endures some of the worst ordeals one can imagine, but she does them without yielding anything to her gruesome captor. Shellie (Brittany Murphy) and Wendy (Jamie King) both show the rough side in what little screen time they get, but the big gun on the feminine side is Gail (Rosario Dawson). The fearless leader of Old City prostitutes, she and her girls slice and shoot anyone who crosses them. So while it appears to be a film primarily about the journeys of three men, it is through the women of Sin City that the stories move forward and each male is able to succeed.
As much as I wanted to hate this film, I really loved it. That’s tough to do because I’m awfully stubborn about that stuff, but it really earned it. It has three great stories presented beautifully and isn’t afraid to step on any toes. Certainly all the characters that die deserve to, though some of them are satisfied if that needs to be their end. Overall, a real quality film.
5 out of 5
I don't think people really believe me when I tell them some of the assignments I get in school. I'm doing a philosophy project out of Lego's. I got to play ping pong with my favorite author last month. And last week I had to watch Sin City. School is tough.
I honestly tried to not like this movie. And it’s the fault of fan boys who praise it as the God of all movies, but they probably don’t even understand why it’s good; It is very good. This is in part to the fact that the author of the graphic novel, Frank Miller, was brought on as co-director. He and Robert Rodriguez (Machete, Planet Terror) used the novel as a storyboard and adapt it nearly shot-for-shot. So in turn, the graphic novel is probably quite good. But there are things out of the ordinary at work in this story that make it a refreshing film to watch.
First off, it breaks the traditional plot structure that a film will use and replaces it with two mini stories and another framed around those two. Marv (Mickey Rourke), a brute, Dwight (Clive Owen), a crafty assassin, and Hartigan (Bruce Willis), a gunned down cop, all get their own little story and each is paired with an equally strong female, which I’ll get to in a minute. I noticed that each of their journeys that we see is driven by a simple motive evoked by some dick character. Marv is fueled by revenge, Dwight seeks to maintain independence for the girls of Sin City, and Hartigan is driven by love in its purest form. While the stories don’t completely intertwine, they each stand on their own with subtle hints at one another. The best use of this is when we get a quick shot of Marv at the end of the film when following Hartigan. It might be the best shot of the film because it says so much with so little, Marv being driven too far by his need to avenge a lover certainly deserves what he gets at the finale of his story, but when we see him later it’s before any of that happens. And even though we know his eventual fate, at that point he is just sitting in the bar having a drink with a smile on his face.
This is certainly the best adaptation of a comic or graphic novel because of how literally it is translated from the page. The cinematography is an outstanding representation of Miller’s novel. From the slight additions of color to the primarily black and white setting (clear representation of the polarized good and evil of the narrative) to the artistic contrast, most notably in Hartigan’s final scene, of each shot, Sin City really blew me away with its look alone.
Now, in a film where most of the women are dancers or prostitutes, I think that it has some of the strongest representations of females. Jessica Alba’s innocent Nancy grows before us from an innocent young girl to a strong woman that endures some of the worst ordeals one can imagine, but she does them without yielding anything to her gruesome captor. Shellie (Brittany Murphy) and Wendy (Jamie King) both show the rough side in what little screen time they get, but the big gun on the feminine side is Gail (Rosario Dawson). The fearless leader of Old City prostitutes, she and her girls slice and shoot anyone who crosses them. So while it appears to be a film primarily about the journeys of three men, it is through the women of Sin City that the stories move forward and each male is able to succeed.
As much as I wanted to hate this film, I really loved it. That’s tough to do because I’m awfully stubborn about that stuff, but it really earned it. It has three great stories presented beautifully and isn’t afraid to step on any toes. Certainly all the characters that die deserve to, though some of them are satisfied if that needs to be their end. Overall, a real quality film.
5 out of 5
Such a great movie; I could watch it all day. Benicio del Toro was another of my favorite actors in it, but Willis was the best. Great stories and characters.
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