By Michael Gleason
A brutal tour through the darkest underbelly of crime, Sin City is a beautiful and relentless assault on the senses. Director Robert Rodriguez has succeeded in creating possibly the coolest-looking film ever, and then backs it up with substance. This is the best picture so far this year.
The movie is divided into three stories: a monster named Marv (Mickey Rourke in heavy prosthetics) seeks revenge for the murder of a prostitute, a killer named Dwight (Clive Owen) is caught in a war between the prostitutes of Old City and the mob, and an former cop named Hartigan (Bruce Willis) works feverishly to save a little girl from a rapist. The stories have a small degree of overlap, but they mainly stand on their own as separate pieces of storytelling. Each story is insane, over-the-top and shamefully enjoyable.
The film’s look deserves extensive praise; the entire 2 hours is a work of art. It captures precisely the feeling of the Frank Miller graphic novels upon which it is based. The rain and snow are used here for perfect atmospheric mood. The cars are hyper-stylized and bounce off the ground with the greatest of ease. The film’s colorization of only certain objects is quite amazing and serves as an excellent way to emphasize important objects. Silhouettes are used brilliantly to punctuate the central moments. This is a world of dark fantasy, ruled not so much by the laws of physics but by the darkness.
The movie definitely does not pull any punches. Violence and gore are not only shown, they are glorified. There are a great number of moments that cause the audience to wince in pain, to cry out suddenly as if injured themselves. Marv in particular takes a superhuman amount of punishment: in one scene he is hit multiple times by a car at top speed, and still walks. Truly, the bandages he wears throughout his story are by no means cosmetic. Hartigan is shot three times in the midst of a heart attack, and still lives. Also worthy of mention is Miho (Devon Aoki) and the expert work she does with her swords. Needless to say, she unleashes quite a bit of blood on the streets of the city.
The music in this film is not so much melodic as atmospheric, and does an excellent job of setting the mood. Foreboding is created, a dark and dreary sense of a city riddled with corruption and vice. In addition, the excellent cast assembled here is noteworthy; Willis, Rourke, Owen, Jessica Alba, Elijah Wood, Nick Stahl, Michael Clarke Duncan, Michael Madsen, Benicio Del Toro and Jessica Alba round out this cast, and most do a great job with the material. However, certain actors do struggle with the format of the movie, and their line delivery can get pretty bad.
Recommending this movie is tricky at best. It is absolutely not for the timid or easily sickened. However, if one’s interests skew even slightly towards film noir or graphic novels, this is a must-see movie. It is truly a great ride, with explosions that blow the audience out of its seat and amusing moments that break through the perpetual clouds that darken the city. In short, spend some time in this city; you won’t regret it.
Final Grade: A-


The comic book-based Sin City is pleasurable on many levels. (Image courtesy of movies.yahoo.com)