A breath of fresh air

Rating: 8/10 (21 December 2016)

Robert Rodriguez assembles an all-star cast for this grimy, bullet-laden, and rather depressingly downbeat film noir offering, which offers slim, testosterone-fuelled plot lines and violence that brims over the edge at every opportunity. To say too much is to spoil the effect; suffice to say that the black and white movie looks brilliant, with engaging scripting and fantastic acting from the principal line-up, and really puts across the look and feel of a hard-knuckle comic book.
The casting is brilliant, with only a dodgy turn from a miscast Clive Owen ruining things; Bruce Willis's hardbitten cop is another fine addition to his stellar career whilst an unrecognisable Mickey Rourke has his best comeback in ages. The girls kick ass and the villains are slimy; in particular the loathsome bad guys are the best parts in the film. There's Nick Stahl as creepy paedophile the Yellow Bastard; Elijah Wood as a fantastic cannibalistic serial killer, and finally Benicio del Toro as a slimy woman-hater. The violence is endless and bone-breaking, with limb-lopping galore and all manner of gruesome torture to engage the crowd. Not sure of the rewatchability of the piece but for the first viewing, SIN CITY is a breath of fresh air.