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Sin City is sick, twisted, depraved, needlessly graphic, and excruciatingly violent. It is also absolutely brilliant. Not only is Sin City the first film of 2005 that I've actually enjoyed, it's the year's first great comic book adaptation, as well as its first great film, plain and simple. It's an exercise in style that is visually striking while at the same time strangely involving, even though all of the characters are vengeful, murderous, and brutal. Shot digitally in its entirety, one of the first films in the world to have been filmed in this way, Sin City, as taken from director Robert Rodriguez from co-director Frank Miller's famed graphic novels, is a film that uniquely deals with the topics of corruption, revenge, self-indulgence, and even sacrifice (though it may seem odd to say so considering that hardly any of the characters rise above petty thieves or murderers). It doesn't have a singular plot, rather several tales featuring a variety of characters that only occasionally intertwine, though each is fascinating. Each story takes place against the gritty backdrop of Basin City, a city so deeply disturbed that some of its residents have taken it upon themselves to scratch out the "Ba" on the welcome sign, leaving it as simply Sin City (an appropriate nickname if ever there was one). And, yes, Sin City is a very simple place...you wrong someone and next thing you know, someone else is screaming bloody murder and your head's on the doormat as a calling card, often in a humorous manner. "She didn't quite chop his head off. She made a PEZ dispenser out of him." The film opens with a short scene featuring Josh Hartnett as a kind of merciful angel of death, The Salesman, whose segments bookend the film. From there, we are introduced to retiring police detective John Hartigan (Bruce Willis) who is determined to go up against Junior (Nick Stahl), the spoiled brat son of a senator who is about to rape and murder a little girl named Nancy Callahan (Makenzie Vega, and, later, Jessica Alba), no matter if his partner Bob (Michael Madsen) doesn't want to mess with the senator. As we delve deeper into the corruptive nature of Sin City we find Marv (Mickey Rourke), a simpleminded tough who is fortunate enough to spend a night with a woman named Goldie (Jaime King) who, as it turns out, is a hooker. When he wakes up, she's dead, and since she was the only person he knew who was kind to him, he goes on a torturous rampage to avenge her death, eventually encountering a psychopathic cannibal rapist named Kevin (Elijah Wood, surprisingly enough). As we take another turn down the backalleys of the city, we come upon waitress Shellie (Brittany Murphy) who is being hounded by Jack Rafferty (Benicio Del Toro), a man who claims they were together even though they only shared one night. Her boyfriend Dwight (Clive Owen) sees him as potentially very dangerous and goes to stop him before he can do harm to anyone. This brings him to the ladies of O Town, hookers who run the city and who keep the police and the mob both out. They are headed by Gail (Rosario Dawson), a feisty woman who, eventually, indirectly because of Jack Rafferty, ends up in trouble with a very scary looking fellow called Manute (the always-effective Michael Clarke Duncan). I think I've covered all of the film's main storylines, though there are many, and eventually they all twist together and parallel in extremely interesting ways. When we eventually realize similarities in the stories, and especially, certain things repeated by different characters, we get the feeling that though all of these people are very different, they are all connected by a thread of desperation and loneliness that keeps the city together. Some places are kept together by friendship and unity, but Sin City is bound by revenge and sadness. Each of the, er, "heroes" in the stories believe that they are acting noble in either avenging or helping someone. While it's most certainly a skewered look at nobility, Sin City is fascinating in the way that though these people torture, behead, and annihilate each other, it's hard to find most of them wrong even if they're going about exacting revenge in the most brutal ways imaginable. It's the lowlife's version of Shakespeare. And, indeed, there is often poetry in the way that the characters speak and the way that they murder. All of the characters speak in the canny, melodramatic style of 1940's film noir, and when delivered properly, it's quite beautiful. Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke, Josh Hartnett, and Clive Owen especially make it sound truly incredible. The dramatic narratives that each of these characters provide are often heartbreaking and truly touching. As they kill or are killed, they deliver sentimental views of death and the lives that they've ended or have led. --Full review at REELPICKS.CJB.NET-- email this review to a friend
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