Graphic novelist Frank Miller teams with myriad stars to bring his creation from paper to the screen to tell us three distinct but interweaving tales from the dregs of Sin City.  John Hartigan is one of the few honest cops in the city, and desires only to save a little girl before he dies, Marv has his mind set firmly on revenge after the love of his life is murdered and he is framed, and Dwight goes from helping his girlfriend to trying to stop an all-out war.

CRITIQUE

Filled with brutal beatings and shootings, cannibalism, multiple castrations, and one case where a character “Doesn’t quite cut his head off.  She makes a Pez dispenser out of him,” Sin City is not your typical feel-good comic book movie.  Based (very accurately, apparently) on Frank Miller’s graphic novels of the same name, this is film noir at its nastiest, with antiheroes, corruption, and betrayal aplenty.

I half expected to see Snake Plissken drop in, fresh out of escaping from New York, but somehow he seems like too optimistic a character for this movie.  Cloaked in perpetual darkness, Sin City is filled with crooked politicians, police, and clergy (including a short appearance by Frank Miller as a confessor) who run the town.  Except for Old Town, which is run by prostitutes (who are no less lethal).  Here, connections count for far more than truth, and lies run the world.

Our story, if there is really one coherent story, begins with John Hartigan (Bruce Willis), a cop dying of a heart condition but bent on saving a kidnapped girl from the sadist son of a powerful senator.  Marv (Mickey Rourke) is a behemoth of a man framed for murder and caught up in plans more sinister than he imagines.  Dwight (Clive Owen) is a murderer in hiding who starts out by defending his girlfriend from a group of thugs, but is soon embroiled in events that threaten the truce between the prostitutes and the police.

For those of us who can stomach the violence or enjoy graphic novels and comic books, Sin City is likely to become a cult classic.  The majority of the film is shot in black and white, with only reds showing through (and with all the blood flying around there is a lot of red), and the special effects do the original work proud in bringing it to life.  Sin City is extremely fast-paced, even with a run time of longer than two hours.  Though Hartigan’s is the main story, Marv is the character closest to a superhero, albeit a very homicidal one.  He crashes through car windows without blinking, throws people through the air, and has a skull that is apparently unbreakable.  After dragging a would-be informant across the pavement while driving, he explains to some prostitutes that he’s been framed and “I’ve been killing my way to the truth ever since.”  If Marv is brawn, Dwight is brains and Hartigan is guts in this triad of heroes.

Are there plot holes?  Absolutely.  But this is not some formulaic action flick where the good guys always come out on top.  Sin City’s mood is bleak to the point of hopelessness; we don’t actually think our (anti) heroes will set things right, we just hope they’ll kill most of the bad guys.  As mindless as all this violence may seem (especially with Marv, who prefers his fists or a good hatchet to guns), one has to wonder about Miller was trying to say with his novels.  The short making-of featurette indicates that the movie stays extraordinarily close to the graphic novels, and with Frank Miller so closely involved in the filmmaking process (both writer and director credits), it may very well be that the project turned out as well as it did by staying true to the originals.

THE VIDEO

Sin City is presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen.  There are few colors save for the red of much of the blood spilled in the film and the occasional highlighting of blue or green eyes, but the video is excellently shot and presented, with a minimum of edge enhancement.

THE AUDIO

Sin City is presented in 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround Sound with an excellent DTS mix.  There are also Spanish subtitles available and a French language track.

THE EXTRAS

For the eight minutes and 43 seconds it lasts, the behind the scenes featurette is pretty good.  Too bad it’s the only extra on the DVD other than a few trailers and it’s so short.  At least you get to hear a little about Frank Miller and his background concerning the film.

FINAL THOUGHTS

If you’ve ever been annoyed by a studio releasing a DVD and then coming out with a slightly better edition of the same DVD a little later, be prepared to be annoyed again.  Sin City is a film I highly recommend, but this DVD release is wanting in several departments.  No deleted scenes.  No making-of documentary.  Sparse commentary from Miller.  Only very brief glimpses at some original artwork.  It’s not terrible that Dimension did not include as many extras as all those, but the fact that there are plans to release a feature-laden DVD some time later (most likely next year) means I can’t recommend buying this one.