Former cop Hartigan (Bruce Willis) in the bar with a very grown up Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba) in Sin CityIn keeping with the film noir theme of my previous posts, I’ll dive right in: Sin City is a movie that instantly blew me away. Not even halfway through the first act I was ready to sign up for the fan club. Sin City is not only a perfect page-to-screen adaptation of Frank Miller’s graphic novels, it is film noir taken to dizzying, larger-than-life heights. The men of this movie are not hard-drinking, cynical, tough-talking anti-heroes just like the protagonists of any classic film noir, they are film noir anti-heroes raised to the purest god-like form. When Humphrey Bogart’s Philip Marlowe goes to bed at night, this is who he dreams he could be. Archetypal heroes face off against sickening villains in mêlées that defy gravity and reason, but still remain rooted somehow in a gritty logic that controls the Sin City universe.
Mickey Rourke’s built-like-a tank tough guy Marv can bust down doors, take more than a few bullets, and get hit by a car more than once and still get up a dust himself off, but in Sin City you take one look at the imposing fella and you believe he can handle just about any pain. Clive Owen’s slick Dwight is certainly not built like Marv, but he’s got a cat-like agility (along with at least nine lives) that make you believe that he can jump out of his girlfriend’s four-story (at least!) apartment window only to execute a perfect landing on the ground below. And my personal favourite is Bruce Willis in the role of Hartigan, quite possibly the only good cop in Sin City, who takes more than one bullet from his crooked partner only to be brought back from the brink of death to be tortured some more. These three can die, absolutely, but only when they’re good and ready.
Sure, no human being could survive HALF the punishment these men go through in the course of the movie, but that is missing the point. These are the film noir anti-heroes of dreams of fantasies; now thanks to Robert Rodriguez they have now broken out of the frames of comic panels and onto a completely new medium. Technology has finally come to the point where film noir can follow the rules of comics: if it looks cool and raises that thrilled feeling in your gut, then it works!
The three men inhabiting the three stories of Sin City are all driven forward by a classic quest: to protect the women they love. Marv is trying to avenge the death of a hooker with a heart of gold, appropriately named Goldie (Jaime King), and is doing it the only way he knows how: beating lots of people up. Dwight is trying to protect the still-breathing hooker that he loves, Gail (Rosario Dawson), who may not be breathing for long after her lady friends accidentally kill a cop. Finally, Hartigan is trying to keep a young stripper, Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba), who he saved from a serial rapist years ago, out of the clutches of this same vengeful (now deformed and yellow) rapist.
Yes, these women are all beautiful and either strippers or ladies-of-the-night. But these are the ideal women that the heroes of Sin City will kill for and sometimes even die for. These women make them feel like more than just thugs blowing things up, spitting out monologues, and generally leaving a wake of destruction wherever they go. To protect these women drives these men to self-sacrifice: they put the burden on themselves so the women can remain (somewhat) safe, or in Marv’s case, so revenge can be exacted. In Sin City, the only victory comes after a lot of pain, and in the logic of the world Frank Miller created this makes perfect sense.
Of special note is the amazing performance of Elijah Wood! Who knew that guy could go from Frodo Baggins to something as creepy as the Bible-reading cannibal, Kevin? All I know is that I can’t wait for Sin City 2.
Mickey Rourke’s built-like-a tank tough guy Marv can bust down doors, take more than a few bullets, and get hit by a car more than once and still get up a dust himself off, but in Sin City you take one look at the imposing fella and you believe he can handle just about any pain. Clive Owen’s slick Dwight is certainly not built like Marv, but he’s got a cat-like agility (along with at least nine lives) that make you believe that he can jump out of his girlfriend’s four-story (at least!) apartment window only to execute a perfect landing on the ground below. And my personal favourite is Bruce Willis in the role of Hartigan, quite possibly the only good cop in Sin City, who takes more than one bullet from his crooked partner only to be brought back from the brink of death to be tortured some more. These three can die, absolutely, but only when they’re good and ready.
Sure, no human being could survive HALF the punishment these men go through in the course of the movie, but that is missing the point. These are the film noir anti-heroes of dreams of fantasies; now thanks to Robert Rodriguez they have now broken out of the frames of comic panels and onto a completely new medium. Technology has finally come to the point where film noir can follow the rules of comics: if it looks cool and raises that thrilled feeling in your gut, then it works!
The three men inhabiting the three stories of Sin City are all driven forward by a classic quest: to protect the women they love. Marv is trying to avenge the death of a hooker with a heart of gold, appropriately named Goldie (Jaime King), and is doing it the only way he knows how: beating lots of people up. Dwight is trying to protect the still-breathing hooker that he loves, Gail (Rosario Dawson), who may not be breathing for long after her lady friends accidentally kill a cop. Finally, Hartigan is trying to keep a young stripper, Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba), who he saved from a serial rapist years ago, out of the clutches of this same vengeful (now deformed and yellow) rapist.
Yes, these women are all beautiful and either strippers or ladies-of-the-night. But these are the ideal women that the heroes of Sin City will kill for and sometimes even die for. These women make them feel like more than just thugs blowing things up, spitting out monologues, and generally leaving a wake of destruction wherever they go. To protect these women drives these men to self-sacrifice: they put the burden on themselves so the women can remain (somewhat) safe, or in Marv’s case, so revenge can be exacted. In Sin City, the only victory comes after a lot of pain, and in the logic of the world Frank Miller created this makes perfect sense.
Of special note is the amazing performance of Elijah Wood! Who knew that guy could go from Frodo Baggins to something as creepy as the Bible-reading cannibal, Kevin? All I know is that I can’t wait for Sin City 2.
No comments:
Post a Comment