Sin City

Sin City (2005)

"Walk down the right back alley in Sin City, and you can find anything..." This idea couldn’t be more true in Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller’s fanboy dreamland film Sin City. By now a lot of the background of this film is well known, but some of that must be acknowleged before exploring the film itself. This project was so important to its director that he left the Director’s Guild of America just to give Frank Miller a co-directing credit on the film. Here is a project that remained so true to its source material that it lifted most of the film directly from the frames of the graphic novels they were based on. Extreme measures were taken to bring the unique visual style of the comics to a live action film. Rodriguez even brought in Quentin Tarantino to direct a small piece of the film, almost flaunting his freedom from the Director’s Guild. Eager to come on board with this rebellious director, stars from across the globe turned out to play pulp roles that fit them like gloves. This is a film that had the fingerprints of a geek landmark of over it before it even hit the screens.

Sin City is a film that relishes its niche, gleefully indulging in all of the archetype’s of the film noir and comic book film genres. If a story is happening, you had better believe that a dame in distress is the catalyst, and that a ruff riding scrapper is going to come to her rescue. You had also better believe that "It's time to prove to your friends that you're worth a damn. Sometimes that means dying, sometimes it means killing a whole lot of people." In this city, dying and killing are the norm, and the film tells three of these nourish stories.

Spoiler Warning!

The film has two sets of bookends. Josh Hartnett makes a cameo as a nameless and mysterious killer who promises love to a woman as he shoots her…we run into this character again at the end of the film, tying up a loose end…or in this case a character who was actually still alive by the end of the madness…but not for long. The next story is cut into two parts, an introduction and then the conclusion taking place eight years later. These inner bookends of the film involve Bruce Willis and Jessica Alba’s characters, Hartigan and Nancy Callahan respectively. This third of the film is based on Frank Millers Sin City chronicle entitled That Yellow Bastard. The quintessential damsel in distress story, Hartigan rescues young Nancy from the hands of a merciless killer only to find himself in the same situation, with the same two people, eight years later. Willis plays up the campiness of the role, and Alba holds her own. Nick Stahl does the most with his role as the unfortunately named Yellow Bastard, making us really disdain him as truly evil.

The next story stars Mickey Rourke and Jamie King as Marv and Goldie. This is the revenge tale of a bruiser taking down anyone and everyone who may have been involved in the death of his Goldie, a one night stand who changed Marv’s whole life. It is also the content of Miller’s first graphic novel in this series, simply titled Sin City. Marv slowly works his way up to the final kill, to the person who put the hit out on his Goldie. Here we find the most humorous and self aware story of the three. Marv takes more shots, punches, hammers, scratches, and shocks than Superman and just keeps on trucking. Mickey Rourke is buried under his makeup, but creates the funnest character in the film. His bloody rampage takes him to unspeakable places all across Sin (short for "Basin") City.

The next story involves rivalry of all kinds, all leading up to The Big Fat Kill (the title of Miller’s Graphic novel). The macro rivalry is between the organized mob of prostitutes who run Old Town, and the gangs and police who are trying to come in and break the power of the ladies of Old Town. In the midst of this, a micro rivalry between Clive Owen and Benicio Del Toro (Dwight and Jackie Boy) bring a personal fight that throws the balance of power in Old Town into jeopardy.

The structure and interweaving of story lines is so key to the film that one can’t understand any observations about the film without that basic knowledge. Sin City is truly the most living comic book yet produced for theaters. That honor had previously belonged to Hulk, which was about the only honor that film deserved. But no film has ever looked more like a living comic, giving an eerie sense of distorted reality. And the interwoven storylines just remind the viewer all the more that Sin City is brought to us by the ingenious mind of Frank Miller.

Sin City is truly graphic, it not only bases itself on the original comic images of the book, but also pulls no punches in its violence, language, or imagery. This is a film meant to be experienced. The stories are visceral, not offering intense depth or character development, but offering shots fired first, and questions asked later. The film is simply great genre filmmaking. It offers little of consequence to the real world, because it strives to create its own world. Sin City is entirely populated with thieves, murderers, cops (who may or may not be dirty) and the occasional honest citizen…who also doesn’t mind selling saws and razor wire to a man who obviously isn’t beefing up the security at the local prison. This is not the world we live in, so when we see the brutal violence, we can remain removed.

The film does often ask one question worth asking, however. When we are presented with a difficult situation, what will it take to call us into action, and to whom will we turn? The characters in this film take justice into their own hands. To them, there is no other way than to solve a problem with a six shooter or their own bare hands. When do we need to confront issues in our own lives like that? And do we turn to God, or trust our legal system, or do we roll up our sleeves and get the jobs done ourselves? The stories contained in this film send out a lonely feeling. If there is no one to turn to for help beyond our own wits, then we truly face a stark reality. But, if there is a Strength and a Love that is guiding us, maybe we’ll end up in a better place than a back alley of Sin City.