Sin City further review.

I picked for my 3 thriller films Sin City (2005), Strangers on a train (1951) and A clockwork orange (1971). The one that i thought was effective opening was Sin City it starts of in a penthouse house on the roof of a skyscrapoer that is overlooking Basin city( this is all shot in black and white). A women (Marley Shelton) who is also in black and white is wearing a red dress walks across the blacony and looks out onto the city the sound of cars,loud talkiing and city night life is cacophonous (this is all done from a birds eye view). Slowly . Slowly soft jazz music starts playing, the sound of the man (Josh Hartnett), who is narrating starts to speak about the women. The camera moves down to an over the shoulder shot to show the man coming up behind her , he offers her a cigarette there is a lot of emphasis of the sound of the lighter. They start to exchange some small talk( the camera moves to another over the shoulder shot of the man looking at the women) he tells her he has been watching her for days (which raises some questions about him and her ),He tells her that he sees in her eyes a “crazy calm” what makes her eyes light up green, he says that she someone one who is tired of running but doesn’t want to face her problems alone. The man moves closer to her (the camera moves to a mid shot of them) he tells her that he can save her and take her far away ( this makes the audience wonder what has happened to the women and why she was running ). The camera moves to a long shot and they embrace (this turns the picture into a cartoon shot of them kissing) The man is still narrating over the top of this happening. Suddenly the man shots her in the back and she dies in his arms. The man says that he did not know who she was running from , but will “cash her check in the morning” .

(on the DVD commentary, frank miller explains that the victim in this story (the customer if the title) is actually committing suicide. The unnamed women had dated a mobster, and when she tried to break it off, he said that he would kill her in the most terrible way possible. She then used her connections to hire a hitman (known as the salesman) to provide her with a quick death.)


About sin city:
The film was released on he 3rd of june 2005
Sin city is a film based on the graphic novel series with the same name what was written by Frank Miller who co-produced, written and directed with Robert Rodriguez.
The film is based on 3 of millers works: ‘the hard goodbye’ which is about a man who embarks on a brutal rampage in search if his lover’s killer, ‘the big fat kill’ Which focuses on a street war held between a group of prostitutes and a series of mercenaries and lastly ‘the yellow bastard’ which is about a aging police officer who protects a young woman from a grotesquely disfigured serial killer.
The Film picked up many critical and commercial success particularly to do with the films unique colouring process, most of the films was shot in black and white but retained colouring for selected objects like the red dress at the beginning of the film.
The film is shot like a cartoon script with 6 different stories (The customer is always right, that yellow bastard (part 1), the hard goodbye ,The big fat kill , that yellow bastard (part 2 ) and the epilogue) that are all based on the corrupt, crime infested hell- hole that is Basin City.

The film has many big names such as Bruce Willis and Clive Owen, here is a list of some of the main the character in the film :
Jessica Alba – Nancy Callahan
Devin Aoki – Miho
Alexis Bledel - Becky
Power boothe – senator Roark
Jude Cicceolella – Liebowitz
Rosario Dawson – Gail
Jesse De Luna – Corporal Rivera
Benicio Del Toro – Jackie boy
Jason Douglas – Hitman
Michael Clarke Duncan – Manute
Tommy Flanagan – Brian
Christina Frankenfield – judge
Rick Gomez- klump
Carla Gugino – Lucille
Josh Hartnett- the man (as seen in the opening of the film )
Rutger Hauer – cardinal Roark
Nicky Katt- stuka
Jaime King- Goldie/ Wendy
Michael Madsen – Bob
Brittany Murphy – Shellie
Nick offerman – Shlubb
Clive Owen- Dwight
Micky Rourke – Marv
Marley Shelton – the customer (as seen in the opening of the film )
Nick Stahl- Roark jr. / Yellow bastard
Arie Verveen- Murphy
Bruce Willis- Hartigan
Elijah Wood – Kevin

The costumes in the beginning of the film is very dressed up and posh because it starts from a posh party at the penthouse, the women is wearing a red slinky dress and the man is wearing a posh suit. Through out the film it is very 50’s MOB dressed costumes with big over coats, ripped tops and trousers for the bad serial killers, suits, slinky dresses and sexy and procutive outfits for the women.

There are no real transitions at the beginning of the film, after the man has killed the women the camera swoops out to show the whole the building and zooms further out to show more of the city in till you see the whole city this is all the shape of the words of Sin city. The camera shows the word of Sin City on a black background, there is a bang and what looks like blood seeps through the city blocks on the words sin city to turn it red. There is a big flash and the whole of the words are in red.

The lighting in the opening of starts off very dark with only the twinkle of the city light . As the camera turns to show the man he is all black and you can’t properly make out his face this is because the lights from the penthouse are so bright. When we get a close up of the characters the lighting is done to show only half of the face because half of it is in shade this makes the character very mysterious because it is like they are hiding from us and wanting to be seen . From when the man shots her there is a big flash of light that makes you jump because it has been so dark but this slowly turns back to darkness only to show slight outlines of the face, but the gun is very bright and light still.