Makes Gotham City look like Munchkin Land ...

Rating: 10/10 (24 July 2015)

Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino are of the same generation, but not the same range of talent, there's one element where Tarantino surpasses his friend : writing and storytelling, and in Hollywood, that means a lot. So at the time Rodriguez made himself famous with the 'Mexican' trilogy and the 'Spy kids' series, Tarantino was already a unanimously acclaimed director and the standard-bearer of a cinematic revolution that gave witty dialogs and random Pop Culture references their significances to weird intricate plots. And I must add with style and an appealing overdose of fun and violence.
Honestly, I'm not much a fan of the three last movies directed by Tarantino, I believe he got so wrapped up in his success that he never tried to get out of his comfort zone. However, I believe the "Kill Bill" series to be his last masterpiece, the pinnacle of the Tarantino touch, a vibrant, flamboyant and emotionally engaging, homage to the Martial Arts movies that influenced him. But the film had style too, and style was an area where Robert Rodriguez wasn't just comfortable but capable to outrank his gifted friend. So, it's just as in 2005, he came out with his own "Kill Bill", a no-less dazzling and hypnotic masterpiece named "Sin City", based on Frank Miller's graphic comic-book series. And that one of the best-looking movies of the 2000's never got nominated for Best Cinematography is as sinful as any of the sins in "Sin City".
Dark and gloomy, the titular setting would make Gotham City look like Munchkin land, it's over-the-top film-noir photography reminded me of these Photoshop effects where I playfully augmented the contrast to give an eerie look to the most banal image. Rodriguez, a man of his generation, understood the endless implications of computerized images : basically, you could make miracles with it. And that's what the movie is, a miracle. The black-and-white look like painted with China ink, and colors are highlighted every once in a while in the most visually affecting ways, blood is like red stains soiling the frame, the blonde hair of that Marv's sweetheart is mesmerizing, and sometimes, colors get you to more sickening reactions such as the guts of that gutless Yellow Bastard. Color is like a protagonist in the film, images serve the story as the story serves them, it's like the perfect symbiosis of the form and the content.
And with an extraordinary wizardry, Rodriguez edits the film to create another spellbinding symbiosis with the storytelling. I said Tarantino was superior in storytelling, but Rodriguez conceals his weakness by adapting the comics on-the-nose, straight-forwardly, an image speaking for thousand words but thousand-word monologues feeling like verbal caresses. Structure-wise, the film employs the same circular narrative that made "Pulp Fiction"'s reputation. In "Sin City", characters meet each other, you leave them someplace and find them again in another, they're always part of the same universe like different pieces of chess game that only at the end, reward your patience and give you the whole scope, through its bunch of crooked politicians, corrupt cops, and 'gold-hearted' prostitutes observing a fragile truce with the Police. With all the gangsters, priests, dancers, lawyers, killers and cannibals, "Sin City" is like the matrix of sex and violence in urban Pop Culture, where being good is the exception... no matter to which side of the Law one belongs.
Hell, what do you expect from such a title anyway? You have your share of Gothic sensuality, high-heels and G-strings, women are poetic sexiness in motion and men lustful and justice enforcers (the true justice), there's an odd mix of old-school characterization and modernity, and the whole movie is so dizzyingly good you never have time to analyze, it's a film to enjoy, to be entertained with. And it's a fun movie where you know all the actors had fun playing in it. In a way, "Sin City" is like Rodriguez' revenge on Tarantino, it's his own star-studded movie with Michael Madsen from "Reservoir Dogs", Bruce Willis from "Pulp Fiction" and a female casting instinct that has nothing to envy on Tarantino, from Rosario Dawson as a luscious dominatrix to the unforgettable Carla Gugino who makes quite an entrance in the film. But I must say Mickey Rourke makes the most durable impression, and I have the feeling that his come-back that pinnacled with "The Wrestler" started with "Sin City".
"Sin City" is a gem, one of the best films of the last decade, a masterpiece of Pop Culture, and Rodriguez' most mature and complete movie. He who asked his friend Tarantino to tell a joke in "Desperado" asked him to direct a part in "Sin City", it was the car scene between Clive Owen and Benicio Del Toro. I have less to say about that moment than this touching interaction between the two directors, there is something of Lucas and Coppola in them, Coppola was already an established director in 70's yet he always supported Lucas and encouraged him to push the envelope as best he could. In a way, "Sin City" is Rodriguez' "Star Wars".