STACK Jan 123

40 / 68

DVD&BD
i-Fi
FEATURE
040
visit
Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez reunite to bring
us four more hard-boiled noir tales from Miller’s
monochrome metropolis SIN CITY, in the sequel/
prequel A DAMETO KILL FOR.
t’s been nine years since moviegoers last
paid a visit to Basin City: better – and
more appropriately – known as Sin City.
As Obi-Wan Kenobi once said of Mos Eisley
Spaceport, “you will never find a more wretched
hive of scum and villainy”, and the same applies
to comic book artist and writer Frank Miller’s
creation. “Sin City’s where you go in with your
eyes open, or you don’t come out at all,” notes
cocky gambler Johnny (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) in
the new film Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, and
viewers will want to keep them wide open
because this long-awaited follow up delivers an
even more striking visual experience than the
innovative original.
The 2004 film, co-directed by Miller and
Robert Rodriguez, faithfully translated Miller’s
graphic novels to the screen in stark black and
white (with the occasional splash of colour)
utilising a digital backlot and green screen to
achieve a unique look. Close to a decade later,
the pair returned to this hard-boiled milieu with
more advanced technology at their disposal and
the added enhancement of 3D. This time the
sets were entirely digital, with the only physical
props being items like tables, chairs, doorways
and stairs.
“The technology was really more advanced,”
notes Rodriguez, “and all the actors just knew
what they were doing. The first time, no-one
had done green screen really, this was only ten
years ago but people were like, ‘what are we
doing, where are the props?’ And now they
understand.
“I always thought that if any movie could lend
itself to 3D, it would be Sin City because of the
graphic novel quality – with the 3D, you feel like
you are inside a graphic novel,” he adds.
Returning alongside Rodriguez and Miller are
several familiar Sin City denizens including the
slab-jawed Marv (Mickey Rourke), exotic dancer
Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba), detective John
Hartigan (Bruce Willis), and Dwight McCarthy
(prior to facial reconstruction and now played by
Josh Brolin). Fans will be quick to point
out that some of these characters
were killed off in the first movie,
but Miller explains that he likes to
play around with the chronology
of his universe. “I bounce from
one point in time to another so
characters can seem to come
back to life when actually, all I’ve
done is go back in time,” he says.
In selecting the Sin City stories
that would make up the new
film, Miller and Rodriguez chose
to include a pair of original tales
written exclusively for the screen (The Long Bad
Night and Nancy’s Last Dance), alongside two
‘prequels’ from the graphic novels (Just Another
Saturday Night and the title story).
“The first movie was all about being very true
to the books and translating them directly to
the screen,” says Rodriguez. “For the second
film we thought, ‘Let’s give them a surprise
so that people can’t just go to the comic book
store, buy the book and know what’s going to
happen.”
The central story, A Dame to Kill For – in
which Dwight encounters the ultimate femme
fatale in the seductive Ava Lord (Eva Green) – is
a Sin City fan favourite, and both Rodriguez and
Miller agreed it should be the primary tale.
“Built around a tragic romance between a
man and the love of his life, it’s a story that
involves a lot of betrayal, a lot of darkness and
a lot of guilt… all the great stuff that goes into
film noir,” explains Miller. “It’s a story that I’m
very proud of.”
I always thought that if any movie
could lend itself to 3D, it would be
Sin City because of the graphic
novel quality
Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez and
Mickey Rourke on the “set”.