Sin City
October 2005 Reviewed by: Roger Kanno Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

Sin City is one of the most original, visually exciting films in recent years. It is adapted from the graphic novels of Frank Miller, who collaborated on direction with Robert Rodriguez. Rodriguez owes much of his success to his family-oriented films such as The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl, and the Spy Kids franchise. But both he and special guest director, Quentin Tarantino, are better known for their edgier productions such as the Desperado series and Pulp Fiction. Sin City is similar to these latter films, albeit with a fantastic visual style that takes it to another level.

The movie follows three loosely related stories about the seedy and corrupt world of Basin City. Mickey Rourke is unrecognizable as the massive ex-con Marv. He is out to avenge the murder of a prostitute named Goldie because she was one of the only people who had ever been nice to him. Bruce Willis is an honest cop named Hartigan trying to protect exotic dancer Jessica Alba from a sick and twisted murderer. And Clive Owen is the chivalrous Dwight who takes on the corrupt cop, Jackie Boy (Benicio Del Toro), and the mob to save the prostitutes of Old Town. The stories are conventional and the dialogue is a bit over the top. Dwight exclaims in the middle of a gunfight, "I can’t tell if Miho is alive or dead, but I’m on my feet and every ounce of me wants to get some killing done." Corny as it sounds, the dialogue complements the outlandish visuals and comic book sensibility of the film perfectly.

There is a lot of violence in Sin City, but it is highly stylized and it is this visual style that makes it so mesmerizing. The strange dark backgrounds don’t look very real, but they are not supposed to. The movie actually looks like a three-dimensional graphic novel. Shot almost entirely in black and white with occasional spot color in high-definition video, the picture quality is amazing. The video often exhibits high contrast that makes the pure black-and-white areas of the picture really stand out, but there is still excellent gray-scale reproduction. This highlights the gloomy but delicate lighting effects that help create the ominous mood of the film. The detail in the close-ups of the actors’ faces is spectacular, which helps to convey their unspoken emotion. Sin City is truly a visual treat with its extraordinary picture quality and innovative cinematography. Anyone with a high-quality DVD player and video display will definitely want to have this one in their collection.

Unfortunately, the audio quality of Sin City does not match its stunning video quality, even though it includes a DTS audio track. While the fidelity is quite good, the sound is limited mainly to the front channels. A holographic, 360-degree soundstage could have greatly enhanced the rich visuals and surreal landscapes. The music score is well recorded, but is used sparingly and is also confined mainly to the front channels. There is a slightly muffled quality to some of the onscreen dialogue although intelligibility is never a problem. The extras are also disappointing and consist of only a very short documentary. There will surely be a full-featured DVD release of this film at a later date that should include plenty of extras for those who care about such things.

Sin City is not for everyone. The violence and macabre humor will not appeal to more squeamish viewers. There are decapitations, dismemberments, disembowelments, castrations, stabbings, and more shootings than you can shake a stick at. In fact, the funniest scene in the movie occurs when a character is impaled by an arrow. However, if you like dark humor and don’t mind the violence, Sin City is one helluva ride.

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