In 2005, director Robert Rodriguez, with Frank Miller and Quentin Tarantino riding shotgun, brought Miller's neo-noir graphic novel seri...
In 2005, director Robert Rodriguez, with Frank Miller and Quentin Tarantino riding shotgun, brought Miller's neo-noir graphic novel series Sin City to life, keeping the hyper stylised aesthetic and hard boiled dialogue intact during the transition from page to screen. It was rightly lauded for its stunning visuals, mainly presented in black and white with flashes of vivid colour, and is the finest example of a true comic book to screen translation to date. Now, nine years later, Rodriguez and Miller have delivered the long awaited sequel, and, sadly, it could have stayed a wish in the heart of every Sin City fan, proving to be a tired, lazy retread of what delighted us almost a decade ago.
Taking it's cue from the original, Sin City: A Dame To Kill For is made up of a number of separate stories all taking place in the titular, corrupt city. Also like the first Sin City, it plays fast and loose with chronology, but to even a greater extent here, telling tales set before and after the original, essentially being a prequel and sequel all at once. But while the originals mixed up time line was easy to follow, here it is just a mess, dumping the prequel A Dame To Kill For storyline, where Josh Brolin's Dwight (played by Clive Owen, post in-story facial re-construction, first time round) runs foul of Eva Green's manipulative Ava Lord, in the middle with no real connection to what surrounds it. Barring a superfluous Marv (Mickey Rourke) story acting as the opener, what surrounds the middle segment, The Long Bad Night and Nancy's Last Dance, actually make for a slightly more interesting movie, but are hurt severely by being pushed aside for a story that doesn't explain it's a prequel and outstays it's welcome far too quickly. The other two stories, concerning gambler Johnny (Joseph Gordon Levitt) looking to score big at a poker game and Nancy (Jessica Alba) seeking revenge for the death of her savior John Hartigan (Bruce Willis) at the end of the original, are connected by Powers Boothe on top form, playing the villainous Senator Roarke. Narrative-wise, they grab your attention a lot more than Dwight's woman trouble, but become stale as they reach their conclusions, mainly down to this movie being a lot tamer than the original. Not in terms of the violence it doles out, there are plenty of heads lopped off and monochromatic blood spilled, but due to the fact the stories never reach the heights of mute cannibal Kevin, or the disgusting Yellow Bastard. This makes it quite flat by comparison.
The visuals are still intact, and are actually quite stunning in places, with stark white silhouettes and flashes of vivid reds and blues breaking the black and white colour palette. Rodriguez and Miller do know how to craft some arresting images, but they seem far too concerned with giving you some visual eye candy, that the pace and story suffer. It's like to them the last nine years didn't happen, and they are giving us exactly what they gave us before. There is no real weight behind anything that happens in this movie. The numerous plots just sort of sit there, hitting their beats when they are supposed to, then moving onto the next eye popping effect. The gruff noir dialogue, part of what made the original so memorable, is grating here, usually presented through drab, uninspired voice over. The cast feel wasted, except for Boothe, who is having real fun here. Josh Brolin especially feels like noir hero for dummies. You never feel for him, making rooting for him that much harder. And seeing Alba trying to play damaged is laughable.
If Sin City: A Dame To Kill For came out even seven years ago, I would have welcomed it with open arms. But as it is, this is a movie made far too late for its target audience, and a perfect example of far too much style over very little substance.
Taking it's cue from the original, Sin City: A Dame To Kill For is made up of a number of separate stories all taking place in the titular, corrupt city. Also like the first Sin City, it plays fast and loose with chronology, but to even a greater extent here, telling tales set before and after the original, essentially being a prequel and sequel all at once. But while the originals mixed up time line was easy to follow, here it is just a mess, dumping the prequel A Dame To Kill For storyline, where Josh Brolin's Dwight (played by Clive Owen, post in-story facial re-construction, first time round) runs foul of Eva Green's manipulative Ava Lord, in the middle with no real connection to what surrounds it. Barring a superfluous Marv (Mickey Rourke) story acting as the opener, what surrounds the middle segment, The Long Bad Night and Nancy's Last Dance, actually make for a slightly more interesting movie, but are hurt severely by being pushed aside for a story that doesn't explain it's a prequel and outstays it's welcome far too quickly. The other two stories, concerning gambler Johnny (Joseph Gordon Levitt) looking to score big at a poker game and Nancy (Jessica Alba) seeking revenge for the death of her savior John Hartigan (Bruce Willis) at the end of the original, are connected by Powers Boothe on top form, playing the villainous Senator Roarke. Narrative-wise, they grab your attention a lot more than Dwight's woman trouble, but become stale as they reach their conclusions, mainly down to this movie being a lot tamer than the original. Not in terms of the violence it doles out, there are plenty of heads lopped off and monochromatic blood spilled, but due to the fact the stories never reach the heights of mute cannibal Kevin, or the disgusting Yellow Bastard. This makes it quite flat by comparison.
The visuals are still intact, and are actually quite stunning in places, with stark white silhouettes and flashes of vivid reds and blues breaking the black and white colour palette. Rodriguez and Miller do know how to craft some arresting images, but they seem far too concerned with giving you some visual eye candy, that the pace and story suffer. It's like to them the last nine years didn't happen, and they are giving us exactly what they gave us before. There is no real weight behind anything that happens in this movie. The numerous plots just sort of sit there, hitting their beats when they are supposed to, then moving onto the next eye popping effect. The gruff noir dialogue, part of what made the original so memorable, is grating here, usually presented through drab, uninspired voice over. The cast feel wasted, except for Boothe, who is having real fun here. Josh Brolin especially feels like noir hero for dummies. You never feel for him, making rooting for him that much harder. And seeing Alba trying to play damaged is laughable.
If Sin City: A Dame To Kill For came out even seven years ago, I would have welcomed it with open arms. But as it is, this is a movie made far too late for its target audience, and a perfect example of far too much style over very little substance.
