A Visit to Sin City

Frank Miller is a legend in the graphic novel and comic realm. For Sin City (2005), he teamed with Robert Rodriguez to deliver a visually stunning adaptation of his work. Rodriguez shot the intro of the film as a test case to prove not only the visual style, but also to convince Miller to work on the project. Utilizing his graphic novel as storyboards, the two essentially worked together as co-directors; Rodriguez ultimately had to quit the Directors Guild of America in order to keep the partnership credit intact (for good measure, Quentin Tarantino also slot in as a guest director in order to try out filming on digital). With a large ensemble cast, an interwoven set of plot lines, and rich and stunning visuals, the film was a leap forward for comic book adaptation films of the time, but doesn’t quite stand up to the critical eye that is looking for fully developed human characters.

The plot of Sin City doesn’t follow a main central character as they embark on the hero’s journey in a linear story; rather, the film is broken into various episodes that feature different characters. Bruce Willis leads “The Yellow Bastard” segment, where he fights against various forces in the city to save an innocent girl played by Jessica Alba. In “The Hard Goodbye,” Mickey Rourke is a man seeking revenge for the prostitute that was slain while under his protection. In “The Big Fat Kill,” Clive Owen, who shares scenes with both Brittany Murphy and Rosario Dawson, follows an abusive crooked cop to Old Town and has to dispose of the body when he gets what was coming to him. Finally, Josh Hartnett bookends the film, providing an intro that sets the tone and stylization of the flick, and anchoring the film with an ending that is made frighteningly sinister simply by his mere presence.

With such a large ensemble cast and interweaving plotlines, there are both standout performances and duds that fall flat within the extremely stylistic world. Bruce Willis sets the tone with his stoic face and battered cop persona. Mickey Rourke, with his face enhanced by prosthetics, his incredibly bulky muscles and gravelly voice, expertly captures the heavy with a heart who feels so naturally weighted within this sinful world. Rosario Dawson, as the dominatrix in charge of the prostitutes of Old Town, encapsulates real confidence as a women in control of her territory. The late Brittany Murphy manages to capture pure terror and project real threat within the same scene. Other actors that don’t quite capture the same specific energy and dark tone of the film is Elijah Wood, who plays a silent creepy kid assassin and Alexis Bledel as the young prostitute that betrays her fellows. Bledel in particular, from her voice to her mannerisms, sticks out like a sore thumb; this is a world of confident and dangerous women and she doesn’t sell that her character even exists within the same city of sin, much less helping to run Old Town.

The most striking aspect of Sin City is the film’s visual style - which was included as an Honorable Mention in my Top 5: Visually Stunning Movies. To achieve the look of Miller’s graphic novel infused with the gritty inspiration of film noir, the directors filmed the majority of the scenes on a digital green screen and utilized colorization to emphasize specific aspects of characters anatomy, clothing, or props.

The black and white format with the bursts of color not only anchors the mise-en-scene within the grounded aesthetic of real world cops and gangsters, but also emphasizes the flair of fantasy from the graphic novel. Rodriguez and Miller didn’t compromise on their vision and each frame of the film drips with sexy women, bulky men, femme fatales, and hard-boiled detectives straight out of Miller’s original comic.

Violence is a constant presence throughout all the episodes, although it is highly stylized and exaggerated. A prime example is when Mickey Rourke’s Marv discovers his precious Blondie has been murdered and hears the cops coming to take him down. He dramatically busts out of his room, destroying the doors and flinging policemen out of his way and diving straight down the circular stairwell. More scenes are presented to the audience, from the prostitutes gunning down the gangsters of Old Town to Elijah Wood hopping around Marv until he handcuffs him. These fight sequences are not realistic, which allows the audience to live in the fantasy world and not deal with the consequences of what this type of violence would actually entail.

In a similar vein of fantasy, the portrayal of women walks a complicated line between victimization and agency. All of the stories center on strong men attempting to protect women they care about; each plot inevitably devolves into disaster for the men and deals various consequences for the women. Marv’s Blondie and Jessica Alba’s innocent bar dancer are women that attach themselves to seemingly powerful men to provide protection, with one getting better results than the other. Marv’s parole officer is a lesbian comfortable with her sexuality and body, but is also held captive and stripped of her clothing, a gesture meant to shame and torture her. In the storyline with the most success (aka survival) for the group of anti-heroes, Rosario Dawson and her tribe of women, with the exception of the snitch, run their section of town, destroy intruders, and save their leader when she is threatened by a gangster. Although all are hyper-sexualized in terms of costume, makeup, and attitude, the story does manage to present a few shades of different women.

The biggest criticism for this noir action film is the lack of character depth and/or development over the course of the story. Perhaps because it focuses on interweaving plot lines that don’t leave time for deeper investigation or perhaps the writer/directors were less interested in that dimension of storytelling, the story and characters are envisioned and delivered as surface level, relying on noir stereotypes, gruff voice overs, and action set pieces to deliver the plot. When I viewed the film originally in theaters, I was struck by the visuals and mise-en-scene, but didn’t feel as though I would need to re-visit the story in the future, as none of the characters presented were compelling. Going into this viewing, I was hoping there might be more to the film than just experiencing the visuals, but ultimately determined that my original declaration held true; not much of substance in this film.

Overall, this film was a major milestone for graphic novel depictions in cinema, both pushing the boundaries in terms of aesthetic, but also confirming stereotypes about lack of substance. The Dark Knight (2008), the film that shattered critics and audiences understanding of comic book films, was still several years away, so Sin City entered the consciousness before expectations had been reset. Chris Nolan’s work focused on a hyper-realistic interpretation of comics book worlds, which is the exact opposite of Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez’s intention here; but, the film certainly did set the stage for 300 (2006), which came out just a year later. Beyond its place in the evolution of graphic novel cinematic adaptations and my appreciation for the visually stunning production value, I can say (this time with even more certainty), that ten years from now, I won’t feel the need to revisit the ravaged ruins of Old Town.