(Non-Spoiler Review)
Forgive me fellow blog readers, for I have sinned. I have borne witness to bodies and blood, bodies and bullets, bodies and beatings, and to bodies and…Bruce! April 1st found me with my eight dollar and fifty cent offering in hand attending the opening night of Frank Miller’s Sin City. (Actually it was a slightly higher offering as I treated the guys to a night of Sin!)
Get a sitter for the kids, lock your baby sister in the closet, and for heaven’s sake don’t tell your mother where you are going because this one earns its R rating with its violent content and its obvious appreciation of the female form.
Now, lest you get the wrong idea from my opening statements let me set the record straight….I really enjoyed this movie!
Sin City is the creation of comic book legend Frank Miller. I have not read the Sin City comic series but over the years I have seen a great deal of the artwork and was intrigued from the very first trailer as it appeared that they were endeavoring to capture the exact look of Miller’s art. Their endeavors were entirely fruitful because Sin City looks amazing. From the opening shot you realize that this movie is different and is going to be unlike anything you’ve seen before. Directors Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez work masterfully together to create a gorgeous black and white canvas, with spare use of color, upon which to paint the violence and degredation that is Sin City. Quentin Tarantino is a guest director on this project as well and if you’ve seen his work, especially the Kill Bill movies, its entertaining to pick out his handiwork on Sin City. Its really hard to describe the stunning visuals and the trailer, though very cool, doesn’t do this landscape justice. Like Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, Sin City is a movie that can be appreciated just for the way it looks on the big screen, regardless of the story behind it. Thankfully there is a very entertaining story to back up the the amazing visuals.
This movie tells a rough and violent tale exploring the darker side of a city apply named Sin. The story is presented in several vignettes that are tied together seamlessly. Sin City is told in voice-over narration reminiscent of old private detective shows, of Mickey Spillane, and (if you’re a PC gamer) of the Max Payne series. It is a dark and turbulent tale that is filmed in such a way that much of the violence is more intense because of what they don’t show you. Don’t dismay, however…if you’ve seen Robert Rodriquez’s other movies, particularly Once Upon a Time in Mexico, then you’ll know that there is plenty of violence to witness as well. In the midst of Miller’s shadowy tale are several instances of a gritty sense of humor that keep the story from becoming too bleak. The plot was intriguing from start to finish and the choice of actors was brilliant.
I generally love ensemble casts and this one was no exception: Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba, Rosario Dawson, Mickey Roarke, Elijah Wood, Michael Clarke Duncan, Clive Owen, Michael Madsen, Benicio Del Toro, Brittany Murphy, Jaime King, Josh Hartnett, Carla Gugino, Rutger Hauer, Alexis Bledel. The cast is a who’s who of today’s hottest young stars and seasoned film veterans. Frank Miller himself makes a brief appearance in the movie. The entire cast did a marvelous job. Even the lesser known actors/actresses were great. It is safe to say that Elijah Wood will make you forget all about Frodo and the Shire and Carla Gugino is definitely not the mother of two children that she plays in Rodriquez’s Spy Kids! 😉 I have to believe that the cast had an absolute blast filming this project.
If you are a Frank Miller fan or a comic book fan in any capacity, you must see this movie. If you like watching movies that stretch the boundaries of how a film traditionally looks then you must see this movie. And if you want to watch a great cast playing interesting characters in a world unlike any you’ve ever seen on the big screen then you must see this movie. I’m looking forward to its future release on DVD just to watch the extras that will undoubtedly be on the disk.
Also, check out the Sin City website. It is one of the best movie websites that I’ve seen in a long while. It is graphically very cool and has a section in which you can take various elements and create your own desktop images. I used it to create the picture at the top of this post. The screen savers are awesome as well. There are also two fantastic trailers and a host of other things.
If you’ve seen Sin City, want to see it, or don’t want to see it, feel free to leave your comments. Please be kind to those who haven’t seen the film by putting the word “Spoilers” at the top of your comment if you intend to reveal anything specific about the movie that may ruin it for others. Thanks! And happy movie viewing!
I was a little worried about how much nudity would be in this movie. They pretty much got that over with at the beginning and left the rest of the film for the action and story telling.
It was a lot of fun!
How’d you guys convince your wives to let you see this?!
I’m looking forward to it. I loved every minute of SCATWOT, story and all. 🙂
I read an interesting view (can’t remember where now) that was slightly negative. The reviewer basically said that because the adaptation was so faithful to the source material, it was therefore redundant. That all the while watching it, you couldn’t help wanting to read the original instead.
True, false?
i wont be seeing it because of (how did you put it?) their appreciation of the female form. movies that i can tell have a core of immorality & nudity, i tend to stay away from.
though i would probably appreciate the visual affects of the movie, so i’ll just wait to see the edited version on tv. lol
oh, and i meant to say that i find it funny that you didnt like bruce.. cuz he’d be the main person out of that long list of actors that i’d actually want to see. lol and would i still like this movie even though i can’t stand work by Tarantino?
I’m sorry if I gave this mistaken impression that I didn’t like Bruce. I just put him in the opening lines because his name started with a “b”. 🙂 Willis, as always, was fantastic! He was a perfect pick for Hartigan!
LOL, Angela! I didn’t expect that you would see this movie. I wanted to be honest in my review about the movies ‘sins’ without detracting from the brilliance of the film. The edited TV version would probably be 15 minutes long.
Rob, we control our women…what are you talking about!??!?!? 🙂 Actually they were at a women’s conference and not a one of them probably had any idea as to what this movie was really like. We will be doing penance for a loooooong time! 🙂
I haven’t read the original but I’ve heard that it is VERY faithful to the comic book. This is the kind of movie that, in my opinion, really wouldn’t work as well if it wasn’t faithful. The stories are so specific that there would be no real point in deviating from the source material. I do want to go back and read these now. What was really cool is that I recognized some shots in the movie that were perfect reproductions of cover art and they were really cool.
Doh!!! It took me awhile to realize that SCATWOT meant Sky Captain, etc… I’m embarrassed!
carl & mary, i just got your package today! i sent you a thank you pm at my site..
you guys are the best!
thank you sooooo much! wow!
If you read my post about the comic convention you’ll see that I tried to get you the first 2 issues of Mystique. I know they have a trade of it out so you may be able to hit your local bookstore and sit there to read the first 2 issues. Or try your local comic shop. I never had gotten those 2, I picked it up starting with issue 3.
And, you’re very welcome!
cool.. i’ll have to keep my eye out for it.. maybe at B&N too.. i know they have a large selection of trade pb’s.
the comic store i frequent only stocks new stuff, it’s a small one..
muchas gracias!
Ok, I feel the need to say something.
This movie is NOT pornographic! It had a couple of nude scenes in the beginning and yes, the women were scantily clad but that is not what the movie was about. The previews and posters out there make it look like Jessica Alba is dancing half nude through the whole movie. This is not accurate, I would say less than 2min have her dancing in that cowboy outfit.
It was 5% sex and 95% violence.
I just don’t want everyone thinking I went to see a ‘dirty’ movie.
The movie sounds really icky to me.
Believe me, Angela (or should I address this to Carl), we won’t be purchasing the DVD.
Angela, I am glad you got your package. Isn’t it great when your birthday gets stretched out over several days? I like celebrating for at least a week.
You crack me up James! 🙂
I agree with the other women…..YUCK!!!!!!
I was telling Mary that what is truly interesting about a movie like this is that it really isn’t all that different from many of the movies all of us have seen. James is right, the nudity in this movie was at the beginning and very short lived. What makes it seem “worse” than the nudity in other movies is the way it is shot and the setting it is in…this is a dark and gritty world. Amelie, one of my absolute favorite movies, is blissfully romantic and wonderful yet it has a couple of embarrassing sexual moments…much more shocking than anything in Sin City…yet I’ve watched Amelie with my wife’s aunt…a Christian school teacher, and wouldn’t hesistate to recommend it to any adult.
The same is true for the violence. The violence is a little over the top, like Kill Bill for example…yet it is the setting and stylization of Sin City that make it seem even more so. It seems unnatural for a movie with a comic book feel to be so violent.
So just as an fyi for my dear Jimmy, he did not attend a pornographic movie…he did attend a movie that is not meant for kids and is not a movie that anyone would want to watch ad naseum…but if you’ve seen violent movies or movies with skin in them before you certainly are not seeing anything different in this movie. Its just that the stark characterization makes it seem more gritty and rough than other movies…and that’s exactly what Miller set out to do with this adaptation of his work. And in this he succeeded.
yes, Mary.. it was perfect timing too.. i was feeling a little down because my close friends from church all forgot my bday!
so you’re thoughtfulness definitely made my week!
I thought the movie was really well done–violent, twisted and all, but then what did you expect from a movie called “Sin City” based (very accurately) on a comic book. This movie does have a core of immorality, but as for the nudity, there was so little of it that I had to be reminded of when it happened and it wasn’t important to the film except to put all things in the city on the same level. Folks, this isn’t a kids’ movie! Nudity is part of our world, and sometimes it’s not pretty and pink. They did an excellent job following and being true, not only to Miller’s style and themes, but literally frame for frame to the graphic novels. After film, I went to a bookstore and picked up a volume of the book–many frames in the film were taken exactly from the book and the stories were nearly identical. Bruce Willis, in fact everyone was cast near perfectly. I didn’t think it was possible, but this is the best comic book movie I’ve ever seen. I’m not sure how an “edited version” of the movie would fare–I think you’d be losing the whole point of Miller’s work, like removing the comment part of a social commentary.
yes, sometimes nudity isn’t pretty and pink…its black and white. 🙂
I thought all comic book movies were kids movies!!!!
Seriously though, thanks for sharing your thoughts on this. Glad you liked the movie. I’m going to be reading the comics (Jeff is bringing them to me on Wed) and I’m looking forward to comparing how well the pages matched up with the shots.
Wow! This movie was unlike any movie I’ve ever seen.
First let me say I liked the movie but didn’t love it. My wife and I went and saw two movies Sunday back to back. First was Miss Congeality 2 – which we both enjoyed ( two thumbs up ) and then we saw Sin City. I read the first graphic novel over 10 years ago but I had forgotten the specifics of the story but I remembered the world plus I’ve seen the rest of the comics over the years so I was familiar with the characters. My wife came into the movie with no Sin City background besides what she had seen on the commercials. She liked the commercials and was excited to see it.
After viewing the picture though Keri really didn’t like the movie. We really didn’t have a problem with the nudity. Honestly there isn’t as much as we haven’t seen in other R rated pictures. The violence though is REALLY graphic though. Keri cringed atleast a dozen times in the film. Frank Miller pulls no punches when it comes to violence. I also think the movie went a little too far with the level of violence, too. Some of the viloence is off screen but too much of it’s on screen.
After viewing the film I checked out the first graphic novel again this morning. It’s the Marv storyline and it’s amazing how much dialogue and images are exactly the same as the original work. Looking at the story in graphic novel form is a lot different than the movie though. The nudity is there and the violence is there but since I’m reading it, it’s not quite so graphic in my mind as it was in the film. As a reader I don’t seem to feel that level of vilolence as the film brought forth. I hope this makes since.
Frank Miller knows his audience when writing comics and it’s male. The film noir feel with old fashined heroes and beautiful women is aimed at us guys and I liked it. He writes some strong women characters but they still have to be rescued by men and thus my wife didn’t enjoy the film as much. Too male fantasy driven but she appreciated the neat way the film was shot.
As I write this reaction I want to throw this out there. The older I get the more and more I don’t like movies adapting comics and books that I love. I always feel jiped. It always seems the world I see in my head, the way characters look, and sound just never translates to someone else’s film version of the story. I really liked the LOTR and Hellboy movies but I still love the original works soooo much more. So many movie adaptions fail to be half as good as the original works ie. LOEG.
Such a down review of a film I truely liked. Positives… So many actors performances where so dead on. MIckey Rourke, Bruce Willis, Jamie King, Jessica Alba, Eljiah Wood, and Nick Stahl were great. In fact I can’t think of anyone who was miss cast. The special effects were great. The rain, Goldie in the car, the bar, etc. All were perfect. I for one can’t wait for the DVD to see all the behind the scenes to see just how they did it all. It isn’t a film I want to see over and over but it is cool enough that I want to see how they did it.
Carl I will bring you the trade on Wednesday for you to borrow. I think you will be amazed how faithful to the source material it really is.
LOEG, for the uninitiated, is League of Extraordinary Gentlemen…or Loads Of Excess Gas which is what that movie turned out to be!
Insightful comments Jeff! Not surprised that Keri didn’t like it. The Elijah Wood scenes are cringe-worthy! And yes, there are few truly satifsying comic movies…the Spiderman movies come to mind, Hellboy, both X movies.
Sin City’s target audience is men but I love that both men and women can appreciate the amazing things they did with the look and color in the film. The Goldie scenes are amazing.
I appreciate you letting me borrow the book!
How could I forget the Spiderman and Xmen films. Spiderman 2 is my current favorite superhero film. I thought Rami really captured the spirt of the comic. Plus the scene with spiderman on the train where all the people tell him they won’t reveal his identity gets me everytime. I also love an early shot in the film where he saves some bystanders from being crushed by a police car flying through the air by catching it with his webbing.
The way Sin City is shot is amazing. Color is used to empahsis just the right moments. You will have to compare the Goldie car scene in the movie to the book too. The movie makes this moment even better than in the book I think. Jessica Alba is also perfectly cast as a stripper. Which reinforces how I can’t see her as the Invisible Woman. I liked her in Dark Angel and here but I just can’t see her in FF. I so hope I’m wrong.
voice of the token female:
ooooooh, sin city, how do i love thee, let me count the ways:
bang! bang! boom! bang!
(sighs amorously)
when can i see it again?
& for the icky reactions, esp. those who felt it was pornographic:
there were hookers, undeniably, but these females kicked ass & ran their own lives fiercely.
long live the mighty women. i only wish i looked that good in fishnets.
Me too!…oh, wait…I wasn’t supposed to admit that I wear fishnets! DOH!!!
there’s a review up at slate (http://slate.msn.com/id/2115999/) which pretty well sums up my thoughts on this subject.
i hope time does not temper my lust for the pulp & that i never become a “wife” who won’t let her man dig on something this obviously cool.
I’m 36 and I don’t think time has tempered my love of things that I have always enjoyed. In fact time has actually made those desires stronger. Of course I’m a big kid so what do I know? 🙂
and don’t be too hard on the wives. They’re all actually pretty cool themselves….and if what I hear about Girl’s Night Out is true, are pretty racey themselves! 🙂
Don’t worry, marriage won’t change the core of your personality! But wait til you have kids…then you’ll start freaking out about all kinds of stuff that you didn’t before. I frequently find myself thinking…”well, yes, that’s okay…BUT NOT FOR MY KID!!” LOL, you start worrying about everything their poor little heads take in etc. Its a scary world sometimes, but babies are just too cute to stop having so we all have to take on the challenge and do the best we can.
And for those of you who may feel the urge to ask…no, we’re not pregnant. I was speaking of babies being “too cute to stop having” in the general sense, not for us!
This is clipped from an email I got from my roommate:
—-
Here’s a phrase I read that mirrored the feeling I got while reading Miller’s “Dark Knight” —
“clipped, meta-speech”
I think a lot of people are having problems with the stylized dialog in SC.
Sort of reminds me of how people reacted to Jennifer Jason Lee’s character in The Hudsucker Proxy.
People, please! It’s part of the genre. Get past it.
I also think some women critics are just not into it. Consider this snippet:
“you are in all likelihood an adult male aging ungracefully, or a pimply youth with a pimply youth’s fondness for comic books about hell on Earth. If you’re a woman of any age who gets off on this stuff, even with its feeble stabs at feminist role reversals, I throw up my hands.”
I prefer the following opinion:
“Watch it, listen to it. Just don’t chew on it too much. It’s not great art, and it’s not great literature. It is just the flat-out coolest looking movie to come along in years.”
I also share the same opinion of Jessica Alba as an actor:
“The acting, what we can see of it, is pretty solid across the board, except for Alba, who is just pretty and does a nice bump and grind. It’s enough.”
jenn see, I guess you’re one of those cool female exceptions! 🙂 Haven’t seen it yet, but I’m anxious for a hole in my schedule.
Critics like Ella Taylor, be they male or female, always annoy me. I get frustrated by the tired old argument given for many movies that they are made for teenage adolescent males. If tons of men and women are partaking in this type of entertainment as well as video games, etc. maybe people need to rethink the definition of what the entertainment likes are for mature adults.
Of course I fall into this trap myself. A few comments above I typed:” Of course I’m a big kid so what do I know?” as if I have to somehow feel bad about being excited by science fiction, comics, etc. Sure, I can admit that some of the books, etc that I loved as a child/young man are not on par with the classic literature of Shakespeare (who I also love…from teenage years by the way) but does that necessarily make it ‘juvenile’ or somehow cheapen it? Critics like the above would say “yes”.
I would prefer a critic who tells it like it is, gives their opinion, but doesn’t revert to putting down large numbers of people in the process. I guess as long as we take it they’ll keep dishing it out!
I love being labeled a ‘geek’…to me ‘geek’ is today’s ‘cool’…but that may just be me. Its a word that, in my mind, associates me with many like minded individuals and yet indicates that I’m an individual in my own right. What I am not is a middle-aged man trying to hold on to my youth. I’ll always be young at heart. Its the tired definitions of what youth and maturity are that drive people like Ms. Taylor to resort to cheap journalistic tactics to try to make her to make her review ‘entertaining’.
Thanks for the links Rob!
Jenn, Rob is right. Its always cool to meet a girl who is into things that are labeled as “guy” things…
Do girls think the opposite I wonder? If a guy is into ‘chick flicks’, shopping, or other things labeled as “girl” things do they think that is cool?
I always think its interesting to meet women who are ‘into’ sports, who really know their stuff.
I’ve always loved that my wife would go to movies like ‘The Terminator II’ or ‘Long Kiss Goodnight’ or ‘Braveheart’ when we were first together (and she still does) because none of my friends wives were into that stuff. They always marveled that she would go with me. I’m also happy that I know her well enough after all these years to know where her boundaries are so I see movies like Kill Bill and Sin City with the boys! 🙂
I also embrace the ” geek ” label. I’ve always liked sci-fi, reading books, comics, etc. It may not have made me cool in high school but I don’t care it’s who I am. I’m also lucky enough to be married to wife who is beautiful and also as big a “geek” as me. She may not have dug Sin City, but she reads comics, fantasy novels and loves movies as much as I do. She is just as excited to see Star Wars Revenge of the Sith, War of the Worlds, Kingdom of Heaven, and Batman Begins as I am. Yet she also loves to read romance novels, do scrapbooking, and does an incredible job taking care of our kids. I also can embrace my love of “chick” flicks and TV shows. I liked Titantic even though it’s considered a chick flick. I also like the TV show Gilmore Girls. It’s got great dialogue! “Chick” show or not I like it. I also watch many HGTV designs shows with my wife and I dig those too. There, I’ve outed my femine side! 🙂
I’m there too! I tested way over on the feminine side on the brain test over on Jenn See’s site! I think I liked Titanic even more than Mary did!
Please don’t say you liked Pearl Harbor, please don’t say you liked Pearl Harbor! Your geekdom is on the line here, Carl!
Fear not, I absolutely hated Pearl Harbor. I thought they took a movie that could’ve been amazing and ruined it with poor actors like Affleck and Harnett. Kate Beckinsale was cute though! I saw it once at the theatre and have (and hopefully will) never see it again. To me Pearl Harbor should’ve focused more on the attack and less on the convoluted love story.
Of course all these same arguements can be used for not liking Titanic! 🙂
I had a big attachment to Titanic because I really like Kate Winslet and the whole Titanic thing has always fascinated me. I thought they did a great job of capturing some of the horror of the situation with the selfishness of some of the people and with the bodies floating in the ocean that could’ve potentially been saved. I’m not big on DiCaprio in it, but love the rest.
i never even watched Pearl Harbor cuz i hated Titanic so much. lol
though, i never heard one good thing about PH to even try to convince me to watch it.
Alright, that’s my girl! 😉
I’ve always been fascinated by the Titanic story. Have you watched the Robert Ballard documentary of when they discovered it? Both it and the accompanying book are fascinating! The first hand accounts of what it was like to hear people dying and the estimates of how long it took a boat that size to sink to the bottom are very eerie! I’ve always found the ocean to be a fascinating and scary place. I think that’s why I went through a phase of wanting to be a Marine Biologist as a kid. A little over a year ago I was able to snorkel for the first time on a trip to Hawaii…it was one of the most amazing experiences I’ve ever had.
are you asking me? the one who never watches documentaries? lol
i tried watching that dragon one, but got bored 10min into it.. and it was way too cheesy.
i love the ocean & the open sea too.. but i’d rather be out on it, than watch a film about it.. hehe
Yes, this was a very cool documentary on discovery channel a few years back. They re-show these every so often in some kind of “mysteries of the deep” thing. Its so fascinating to actually see them discover a ship that had laid undisturbed for sooo many years. Great show!!!
Angela, I understand your opinion about docs. I used to be similar. I think you need better recommendations! 😉
If there was just one that I could suggest, one that would keep your attention, I think it would be… “Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control” by Errol Morris. It isn’t what it might sound like at all. It’s about these four guys: a topiary gardener, a rat biologist, a lion tamer, and a robotic engineer. It’s incredibly artistic in weaving these four disparate people together into one tapestry. It took over 2 years to edit and it shows.
Link to that doc
lol, how do you hear about these things?
Well, in the case of Error Morris, I did some searching on who directed those catchy Apple ads a few years ago. Remember the ones with the people sharing their bad experiences with Windows?
They were done by him. So I started renting his stuff. He’s a genius.
There are a few cool magazines and websites I follow to keep up. Roger Ebert, I read him a lot.
Good times. 🙂
Ok, Carl, I’m jealous. You’ve got over 40 comments and the discussion is now completely hijacked. How is it that any one person can be this popular?!
Oh, darn, make that 42. er.. 43!
44.. he inspires good conversation!
Its not popularity, believe me. I honestly think a big part of continued conversation on posts is that I try to make the effort to answer back each comment…I find that it keeps the discussion going and also, I hope, makes everyone realize how much I value their comments because I really, really do! I love you guys! 🙂
And thanks for the artificial inflation of the stats! 🙂
I LOVE Bruce Willis. I’m in love with Hartigan. And I LOVED Sin City. Nuff said =)