Sin City

From peoplesforum:

Saw Sin City. Could have been Robert Rodriguez's best. Isn't. Not surprised.

Was leafing through the Frank Miller books. Huge part of the problem I think is the source material--between Miller's harder-than-boiled style and Rodriguez's slavish devotion there just isn't much room left for anything particularly evocative, and we're talking about noir, the genre that's produced some of the more fascinating films or books around. He's gone Peter Jackson on us.

ChrisJ: I still admire the fact that even as he turns into a remake of Roger Corman vis-a-vis Larry Cohen--he does it saluting the Hollywood establishment with his middle finger.

I don't think Rodriquez will come close to ever making a GREAT MOVIE....but he's gotta be influencing some folks out there and we'll see something come of it.

Well, right now, I think the spirit and techniques he uses to make a movie are more interesting than what he actually does with them.

Chungking Express: I liked Sin City--it was like ultra-high-quality softcore porn, with a good amount of action and violence mixed in. Plus, the sheer escapism of it appeals to me.

The graphics, the colors--and lack of the same--had style, sure, but the editing is so off. He's cramming three major stories into a mere two hours, and they're going by too fast for any emotion to develop, or any image to sink in.

Not that the images develop into anything profound. I'd say Miller is a good artist, but a psuedo profundo writer.