"Sin City"

The interwoven plots of "Sin City" draw in a motley clan of peripheral characters, including a lesbian parole officer with a tough heart, sterling principles and heartbreakingly luscious curves (Carla Gugino); a deadly, whisper-quick warrior girl (Devon Aoki); a sweet-natured stripper beloved by every decent person who knows her (Jessica Alba); and, perhaps most unsettling, a spritely werewolf boy in a neon-nerdy Charlie Brown jersey (Elijah Wood) who whisks women away to his remote farm, where he eats the body parts he likes and throws the rest to his dog.

Did I mention that "Sin City" is sick as hell? The atrocities, some of which will make you feel at least vaguely ill even as you laugh at them, include ears and various other body parts being blown off with gusto, sternums being pierced with thick, sharp objects, lead pipes cracking remorselessly against human skulls (the sound design of "Sin City" is sometimes harder to take than the images), and numerous guys being axed or otherwise compromised in the crotch (this particular theme seems to be a favorite, as "Sin City" views dumb machismo as the world's least valuable commodity). When a wrongly accused criminal finally hits death row ("They shaved my head and fit me with a rubber diaper"), he taunts his executioners when the first jolt of electricity isn't enough to kill him: "Is that the best you can do, you pansies?" he growls, as thick waves of blood gurgle from his mouth.

If you're waiting for a "but" here -- something about redemption or the ultimate imparting of solid moral values -- you're not going to get one. "Sin City" isn't an emotionally complicated picture or a particularly deep one, and its freshness lies in the way it refuses to pretend that it is. That said, "Sin City" does have a steel-beamed moral infrastructure -- Miller's view (and Rodriguez's too) of right and wrong, goodness and evil, frames the movie as solidly as, well, the bars around a comic-book panel. And the movie's sexual politics are straightforward but not necessarily retrograde: The safest and sanest part of town (relatively speaking, at least) is the section that's populated and run by its prostitutes, who know what's what and conduct themselves accordingly. They understand the nature of men better than men themselves do -- not a new idea by any means, but one that refuses to buy into the idea of women as simpering victims who need to be protected.

Part of what makes "Sin City" work is that while the performances may be somewhat broad (they need to be, to suit the material), they stop at being grotesquely cartoonish. Owen is always a dazzling, uncompromising presence, and he puts his considerably roguish charms to work here, too. Accosting a bad 'un in a bathroom -- where else does one inflict near-drowning-by-swirlie? -- he introduces himself with the stunningly original line, "I'm Shellie's new boyfriend, and I'm out of my mind." Willis, so big a movie star that he's rarely given credit for being a terrific actor, brings a strong measure of tough-guy melancholy to his role here. And although Rourke is barely recognizable beneath his makeup and prosthetics -- he resembles a beefed-up, mutant Kirk Douglas -- he allows the roughed-up soul of his character to shine through.

Next Page: Black and white ... with a few splotches of color

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