Courtesy of my new Netflix account, you are going to be getting recommendations for movies that are older than your brother's can-you-believe-they're-starting-second-grade-it-seems-like-they-were-just-born twins. I apologize, but there it is.
Sin City captivated me from beginning to end. Everything about this movie is pure candy: the selective use of primary colors in an otherwise black and white film, the blocky cut-out industrial background scapes, the over-the-top violence, and of course the hard women and harder men.
The dialogue would come off clichéd and hackneyed anywhere else, but in this noir confection, it's a pitch-perfect device.
Kill em' for me, Marv. Kill 'em good.
I won't let you down, Goldie.
Prior to watching Sin City, I knew nothing of Frank Miller's work. He produces graphic novels, which I am not supposed to call comic books, but watching Sin City was like tumbling through one pulpy page after another. Every frame is steeped in whiskey and smoke in the night, with plenty of stiletto heels and splatters of blood to mark the territory.
Whatever you do, get this one. Get it for the cars and the throaty voice-overs. Oh for Christ's sake, get it for the dames. You will not be able to take your eyes from the screen.
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14 comments:
I have mixed feelings about Sin City and Miller's work. While I enjoyed the movie (and it has been quite a few years since I saw it) it felt thin - violence and broads just for the sake of violence and broads. Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow was similar - visually striking, but it left me unfulfilled. Sin City wasn't quite on the same level, but it was in the same ballpark.
Thinking now, I liken it to sex with a hot but emptyheaded woman. There are plenty of people who are ok with that, but it's not enough for me, you know?
Now of course, all I want to be is a hot and empty headed woman.
help.
You know, I think your critique is completely valid, but I was so impressed with the craft of the thing, I guess I didn't care that it was a little thin.
Craft is like that sometimes. If you do it well enough, your admirer will not see the blemishes (and there were blemishes--in today's clip, for instance, Marv wasn't drunk enough to pass out that hard)
Sin City was such a comic-book fanboy's wet dream. An almost perfectly rendered film version of the graphic novels. Great visuals and perfect casting. Clive Owen as Dwight, Bruce Willis as Hartigan and (ohmygod) Mickey Rourke as Marv. Mickey Rourke WAS fucking Marv! Even the smaller roles were nearly perfect. Elijah Wood (playing against type) as Kevin, Benicio Del Toro as Jackie Boy, Nick Stahl as the Yellow Bastard, Carla Gugino (holy hell...sexy) as Lucille, Jessica Alba as Nancy and Devon Aoki as deadly little Miho. The only role that seemed forced was Brittany Murphy as Shellie. Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller did an incredible job with this adaptation. Incredible.
Rourke's gravelly voice in the voice overs was unbeatable.
Now how in the heck am I supposed to get anything done with hot and empty headed women on my mind.
Damn the Internet.
RJ
Frank Miller is a horrible, horrible person (you can look it up!). I've seen him in person and the creepiness radiates. That said, "The Dark Knight Returns" is a freaking work of genius and everyone should read it. It's better than "Sin City" in most opinions. ;)
Now of course, all I want to be is a hot and empty headed woman.
O'brien, my sweet, there is no way in hell you could swing the empty-headed thing.
Also, I do not hold with disdaining something because the author is a dick. The work stands or falls on its own.
Yeah, what Dean said--plenty of authors were/are "dicks" of one form or another. And I teach LIT-ra-cha, so I am authorized to so declaim.
Mrs C, dean, I agree as well, for what it's worth...and not just in lierature. The arts in general seem to have far more than their fair share of trouser snakes. I will admit that I have soured on certain musicians and authors from time to time, but it's never been traumatic enough to completely cut ties...
MR
Here's my best advice: ignore *who* the writer is as a personality; it doesn't matter. It *doesn't*, because each and every [literary] text is *AUTHORED* in symbiosis between the writer and the reader; a book is absolutely nothing when it is closed and sitting there on the table or shelf. It comes into being when the reader opens it and engages it and brings all of his or her connotative experience to it.
Here's more what: I personally *love* that one of my favorite authors sounds in her books Just. Like. she does here, in her 'blog. And I'm betting in "real life" she sounds the same. We tend to be fairly compatriotical in spirit, too, which helps that whole flow thing. But even if she were a (ahem) dick, I'd still love Harvey and Eck unremittingly and unabashedly, and that is at least in part due to what *I* bring that enriches that achingly beautiful little story.
Thanks for all the thoughtful comments, gang. I got seriously taken to task of facebook for endorsing something by the terrible Frank Miller. Oh well.
And a special thanks to you, Mrs. C, for a very nice little lift just when I needed it most.
"The arts in general seem to have far more than their fair share of trouser snakes."- Mrs C
Given her performance in the past couple threads I'd say Mrs C is an early favorite for poster of the year.
RJ
That was MR's line, but I appreciate the sentiment.
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