A Trip to Sin City

Article posted Sat Apr 2 08:04:09 2005

Sin City is a series of gritty revenge stories set in the shadowy world of Basin City, a place swimming with hookers, strippers, assassins, serial killers, cops, mercenaries, and even a few garden variety thugs. One main character is trying to avenge the death of his favorite prostitute; another is trying to save a kidnaped young girl.

With Sin City, Robert Rodriguez, the maverick filmmaker who famously broke into the film business with the micro-budgeted El Mariachi, is trying to do something no one has done before. Rodriguez is almost literally filming a graphic novel, shot for shot. Using Frank Miller’s series of graphic novels as basically a guideline storyboard, Rodriguez brings Sin City alive. This will make for fascinating special features on the DVD release, where audiences will be able to compare Miller’s drawn panels with Rodriguez’s filmed scenes. The result is visually impressive, as each new scene brings an artistically conceived (and dramatic) splash panel. Most of the film is shot in black and white, with color used sparingly and to good effect.

The line between comics and film has been crossed before, for example in American Splendor, but Sin City is far more ambitious than anything previously attempted. Whether gimmick or bold new style, the ultimate issue is whether it pays off or not. The salient thing about style is novelty. We like new styles because they are fresh, but after we become accustomed to a given style, it loses its novelty and therefore its appeal. The same thing happens with Sin City; after about an hour, the style begins to wear a little thin.

Frank Miller has been (quite rightly) criticized for his one-dimensional, misogynistic female characters. Miller’s mind (and therefore Sin City) is populated with women who are all ruthless hookers, sex-soaked strippers, or pedestalled angels— not a shred of humanity or depth to any of them. If Miller is incapable of any interesting or sympathetic women, the men don’t fare much better; heroes and villains alike are sadistic, macho barbarians. The villains are simply uglier and have correspondingly more perverse goals. The devil’s advocate excuse I heard one critic give, that the characters are supposed to be one-dimensional since they are obviously comic-book characters, misses the point. There are plenty of comic book / graphic novel adaptations that have fleshed out characters: Miller’s own Batman adaptations are a case in point.

Sin City has become a cult favorite for a legion of Miller’s fans. I understand and respect the hard-boiled noir tradition Miller is steeped in and aiming for, but its appeal is also its limitation. Sin City is relentlessly bleak and unredeeming. The plot gets repetitious, and I was left wondering if Millar had anything left in his bag of tricks. I can appreciate stylized gore and violence as much as the next person (maybe more), but at some point the film sort of looped back on itself. Oh, look: More violent beatings! More distinctly non-medical amputations! More castrations! More dramatic poses! More leather-and-fishnet clad strippers! Oooh! becomes yawn.

In one wraparound storyline that collapses into implausibility, Bruce Willis plays John Hartigan, a good cop with a bad heart on the trail of a sadistic sex fiend who kidnaped an eleven-year-old girl. (Notice that it is almost always young girls who are in filmed jeopardy; apparently screenwriters assume audiences won’t care if a young boy is in danger of being molested and killed.) Hartigan arrives just in time to save her, but is very nearly killed in the process and ends up jailed for nearly a decade. When he gets out, the scenario repeats itself (though the sex fiend has been hideously deformed and now resembles an anemic Ferengi). But now little Nancy has grown up and filled out into a sexy stripper (Jessica Alba) old enough to be Hartigan’s granddaughter. The two have apparently (and inexplicably) fallen deeply in love with each other while he was in prison, based on meeting for a few minutes that one terrifying night so long ago. (When Hartigan calls Nancy “the love of my life,” I had to stifle a laugh out of courtesy to the other film critics.)

The cast includes an impressive list of stars, including Clive Owen, Bruce Willis, Benicio del Toro, and the always-watchable Powers Boothe. Elijah Wood has a bit part as one of the most memorable characters, a mute cannibal serial killer. Most of the cast do a good job, with the exception of Brittany Murphy and Rosario Dawson, who are both so painfully over the top (and in this movie, that's saying something) that they are unintentionally laughable.

It wouldn’t be fair to say that Sin City is all style and no substance, because Miller’s stories and tone are interesting and appealing, up to a point. He tries to work in themes of redemption and revenge, good and evil, innocence and pollution, but it’s all done so ham-handedly that it’s impossible to take very seriously even on its own merits. A for effort, B for style, and a D for script leaves this critic appreciating seeing something new but wishing there was more to this Sin City.