Sin City: A Dame to Kill For
The much anticipated monochromatic sequel returns to theaters with several new story lines (Both Pre and Post the Original Sin City.) I normally am not a huge fan of movies in 3D, but I have to admit that this one is MADE for the genre. Directors Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez have this edgy style of black and white with a miniscule color palette thrown in down to a science. Combined with the 3D effect, the viewer is indeed transported to a graphical and visually stunning world far away from reality.(And that’s a good thing here.)
I only wish that the action tales could have matched the visual cornucopia. Without spoiling, let me just say that most of the stories were very predictable and lacked the defiance and edginess that made the original a cult classic. That being said, I probably enjoyed “The Long, Bad Night” with Joseph Gordon-Levitt (playing a very brash and cocky gambler ) the best. It contained lots of great plot twists and turns and featured great cameos by the likes of Lady Gaga and Christopher Lloyd.
The main story is centered around “A Dame to Kill” as Ava Lord (Eva Green) plays a beautiful, but deadly character who pretty much gets what she wants from men and has no problem showing her feminine wares to achieve her goals. Marv (Mickey Roark) shows up in all the stories and is another character that you simply cannot get enough of.(Even going back to the original Sin City.) This time he teams up with Dwight McCarthy(Josh Brolin) to try to combat Ava Lord. Pretty predictable story here, but fun nonetheless.
The last story “Nancy’s Last Dance” shows the transformation of Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba) from the shy, helpless girl in the original to a cold and ruthless killer determined to exact revenge. Once again, Marv gets to play hardball here and Senator Roark (Powers Booth) is very good at being the guy you want to hate. (I swear he is the REALLY bad guy in every tv show or movie these days.) Once again, pretty straight forward and quite predictable.
All in all, it was an above average movie made very interesting by the 3D environment and the stunning graphical elements at play. Considering it was almost all shot on green screen, the post processing work and renderings are pretty spectacular.
A fun 6 out of 10 stars.
