Sin City

[Seattle Zack]

I saw this movie over the weekend, and was absolutely blown away. It's based on a series of comic books ... er, graphic novels, I suppose they're called nowadays, by Frank Miller. I'm not familiar with these particular comic books ... graphic novels ... but I do know Miller's work from the Dark Knight franchise.

I'm a big fan of comics, and as of late, they've been translated so poorly to the big screen. Schumacher butchered the Batman franchise, and that awful Daredevil was nearly as unwatchable as Gigli.

It's such a different medium, that I'm really impressed with what the director of Sin City (Rodriguez, the Tarantino protege from El Mariachi and From Dusk Till Dawn) has accomplished. Apparently the whole thing was filmed blue-screen, so it's all fantastic CGI, but it's so faithful to the paneled action of a comic that it works. At least, it did for me.

This is an extremely violent and graphic movie, and not at all for the faint of heart. It's like nothing I've ever seen, almost like a conceptual art piece. I'm sure the critics will be sharply divided over it, but as a groundbreaking work of film, I think it was truly remarkable.

I don't want to even mention any of the storylines, for fear of spoilers. Suffise it to say, this may be the role Mickey Rourke was born to play.

Anyone who's actually seen this movie (rather than just read about it), I'd like to know what they thought.

 

[elsol]

I think they failed to understand the differences in the medium.

In a comic book, stories can be unconnected; in a movie, vignettes have to touch each other somewhere, somehow.

The character transfer were not enough in my opinion... there needed to be more connection for it to work as a movie rather than just a moving comic book.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[Seattle Zack]

In a comic book, stories can be unconnected; in a movie, vignettes have to touch each other somewhere, somehow.

So you didn't see the movie, then. All four stories were connected. Don't you remember the bar scene? It was central to the movie.

 

[elsol]

So you didn't see the movie, then. All four stories were connected. Don't you remember the bar scene? It was central to the movie.

I saw the movie, or else I wouldn't have said anything.

And yes, the bar scene was a connection between characters, but not one between stories.

It was four completely independent stories told with the same backdrop because there was so little (if any, I would argue) connection between the stories, there were stories that you LIKED and stories that you sat through.

I like the mickey rourke story... completely awesome and adrenaline driving; the Prostitute story was so-so, the cop and little girl was way to separated in its beginning and climax as soon as you figured out "Oh, hey that's is the little girl... cool', you were done.

Was there a point to the assassin scenes?

I think the movie would have been significantly better as a movie with two stories rather than four, or just one long mickey rourke story which was had the best developed characters, story, and action.

As a moving comic book it was cool, as a movie it left a lot to be desired.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[NoJo]

I haven't seen it, but it looks well worth seeing, from what you two have said so far.

My favorite comic-style movie is "American Splendour".

I was Marvel fanatic as a kid, but they've never made a movie of the character I was most into, Dr Strange, (Master of The Mystic Arts). He didn't get his own comic until 1970. Before that, the comic was split between him and Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.E.I.L.D., drawn by the amazing Jim Steranko. They did make a Nick Fury movie, but it was shit.