Sin City

Rating: 8/10 (18 August 2005)

I thought about Sin City a bit...and realized how chauvinistic it is. All three male characters' motives are to save some damsels in distress--Willis saves Alba, Owen saves the Old Town girls, and Rourke saves(helps) Wendy. Even the seemingly strong female character needs rescuing(Rosario Dawson). The only exception to this is Miho, the Japanese assassin, but she's not the brains behind the operation; Clive Owen is. Other than that, I think the movie's concept is OK--in a city choke-full of sin, the good guys divert their energy into saving their perception of goodness--which is women, apparently.
Of course, the intended audience of the movie are 20-something males, and the movie/comic book plays to feed their interests of violence, underdogs, and women. So I can't say I expect anything else in the contents. But I wouldn't want it any other way. The product came out well.
Another thing--the format of the movie is more along the lines of a comic book, rather than a movie. Due to that, the pacing of the movie was a bit lagging.
But the awesomeness of the way the comic book visuals were translated into film blows away most of the doubts I have about this movie. It is absolutely gorgeous. The black and white, with red splashes and shocks of yellow are so striking, so well-shot, that I can't say enough good things about it.
A couple of other highlights of the film--the soundtrack was quite unique. It went well with the movie. Also, Elijah Wood is beautifully creepy as the cannibal version of Charlie Brown.
Sin City is not flawless--but the originality with which this film was produced and directed just lifts this film high above most other films I'm seeing these days.