Everybody's a critic: 'Sin City'

One star (out of four)

There should be a new rating added for this movie: "D" for dumb.

The poorly done opening scenes and credits are just a prelude of what is to come. There are three rambling stories that make no sense, nudity that adds absolutely nothing to the movie and blood that doesn't look like blood.

Mostly done in black and white -- it must have been cheaper to make -- the entire film looks cheap and unimaginative. There are way too many severed body parts squirting way too much (non-red) blood, and way too many unhappy people wielding way too many sharp weapons.

Well, you get the idea. Add to this mess Bruce Willis with an expected but unexplained scar on his forehead, a very ugly Mickey Rourke, a very creepy Benicio Del Toro, and story lines that are nearly impossible to make sense of, and this is a prime opportunity to save your money for another movie.

Oh yes, I almost forgot about the creepy guy that loses his jewels and morphs into a Ferengi-looking thing with better te

eth, so he can grow another set, just to lose them again. What a waste of film and acting ability. Good thing I got my ticket for free.

-- Ken Cook

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Three-and-a-half stars (out of four)

"Sin City" has been called "new filmmaking" by critics amazed by its visual aesthetic -- which is mind-blowing. Stylized, adrenalized and violent, the art of "Sin City" takes such recent visionary films as "Kill Bill" and "House of Flying Daggers" a step further by pumping their art into film-noir fantasy.

The story is almost inconsequential. Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke and Clive Owen are the protagonists, as an obsessively protective cop, a killing-machine thug on a romantic quest, and a mysterious do-gooder; Jessica Alba, Jaime King and Brittany Murphy are the "dames" (the movie can be blatantly misogynistic, but what do you expect from what's essentially an adolescent fantasy?) and villains include corrupt senator Rourk (Powers Boothe), his deformed son (Nick Stahl) and Elijah Wood in a silent, terrifying role.

"Sin City" is the creation of director Robert Rodriguez and comic-book writer Frank Miller, and stays so faithful to the source material that several scenes play out exactly as they do in the comic. Visually, it's amazing, but if this is new filmmaking, it'll have to learn to match those visuals with stories of substance and originality.

-- Davis Dunavin