Graphic, novel aren’t understatements for ‘Sin City’

JIM ERWIN

What does the world look like when you travel beyond the Orange

Curtain? It’s dark, violent and intoxicatingly sexy. It’s “Sin City.”

It’s kind of scary how many Orange County residents really feel

that way about traveling to Los Angeles.

Frank Miller’s “Sin City” is a place that is dripping with

corruption, vice and blood. There’s a lot of blood, and no man is

innocent.

The movie has three different stories, all based on Miller’s

graphic novels “Sin City,” “The Big Fat Kill” and “That Yellow

Bastard.”

A couple decades ago, a number of artists began to look at the

comic book format and experimented with ways to use it to tell more

sophisticated stories than Archie and Jughead. Miller was among the

artists creating graphic (illustrated) novels for adults. His work is

comic book noir. The characters struggle with their personal demons,

while trying to cope with the reality of a world that’s dark, cold,

hostile and frequently violent.

When I discovered Miller’s work, one of the first things I noticed

was the outstanding production values. Every detail was carefully

crafted. The glossy paper stock was much better quality than the

traditional comic book newsprint. The black ink was a deep, rich

black, which connected the artwork to the darkness of the stories.

Visually, the movie “Sin City” is a real treat. It emphasizes

style over substance, but the style is executed perfectly. The film

is black and white, with an occasional high contrast color thrown on

a character for emphasis. Alexis Bledel has beautiful blue eyes,

which bring out her youthful charisma. Jaime King’s golden hair and

ruby red lips radiate fiery sexuality. When these characters are on

the screen, their small splashes of color are the only color images

we see. The rest of the frame is basic black and white.

Morally, “Sin City” is a black and white world. There’s never any

doubt about who’s good and who’s evil. The men are macho and tough.

Life has left them with scars both inside their hearts and on their

faces. The women are flawlessly beautiful and unrepentantly sexual.

The city is always dark. Nothing feels safe.

The movie’s three stories are about men who are protecting people

they love or who seek revenge against those who harmed their loved

ones.

Bruce Willis is an honest cop who is wrongfully jailed for a

heinous crime against a child. Mickey Rourke is determined to avenge

the murder of the only woman to ever treat him with kindness. Clive

Owen is disturbed by the violent way Benicio Del Toro treats women

and wants to make sure that Del Toro never hurts anyone again.

In each story, the situations spiral out of control and become

more and more violent.

This movie’s cast is mind blowing, and the performances are out of

this world. In addition to the stars already mentioned, the men in

this movie include Elijah Wood, Michael Clarke Duncan, Powers Boothe

and Rutger Hauer. The women include Jessica Alba, Brittany Murphy,

Rosario Dawson and Carla Gugino.

It’s obvious all of the performers had a lot of fun making this

movie. No one tips their hand or winks at the camera, but there are

times when the scenes are so intense and over the top that it’s

absurdly funny. If you got paid a dollar for every time Mickey Rourke

spits blood, you’d walk out of the theater money ahead.

“Sin City” is definitely a guy movie. The men in it are strong,

flawed and interesting. The women are mostly two-dimensional, sexual

beings. Almost every woman in the movie is a prostitute.

On one hand, it all seems painfully adolescent, but the characters

of “Sin City” live on the fringes of society. If the stories were

about emotionally centered human-resources executives, it just

wouldn’t be this much fun.

It’s important to remember that these kinds of edgy characters

hadn’t been seen in comic books before Miller and other artists

decided to take a chance and create graphic stories for adults. What

makes “Sin City” the movie unique and special is how the film’s

visual style replicates the emotional power of Miller’s printed work.

This movie is a celebration of an artist who took chances to create

something new and different.

The film’s tagline is that if you walk down the right back alley

in “Sin City,” you can find just about anything. You certainly won’t

have any problem finding a movie that’s worth your ten bucks, because

this one is hot.

* JIM ERWIN, 40, is a technical writer and computer trainer.