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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAS
TUESDAY, AUGUST 26, 2014
PAGE 7
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New 'Sin City' sports style but little punch
"Sin City" remains one of the best achievements of a film truly looking and feeling like a comic book, with violence so extreme it can get cartoony, highly animated sets and a stylized black and white palette punched up with occasional splashes of color. Those elements are still the same, but in the nine years it took for the sequel to come to life, the mojo that made the first so potent seems to have been lost.
While many of the original players return for this second set of violent and gritty tales maxing out on film noir indulgences, the problems with "Sin City: A Dame to Kill For" begin with the wicked cool Clive Owen not reprising his role of bad boy Dwight. Instead, Josh Brolin fills in with a hard-headed, uncharismatic performance that lacks the slickness, which made the character such a badass in the first place.
The other Frank Miller sequel this year, "300: Rise of an Empire," also faced the issue of an unengaging lead. Both films helped balance this out with a delicious villainess performance from former Bond woman Eva Green. As the titular dame, she's a femme fatale with dastardly plans, embroiling Dwight in a classic film noir setup that escalates with growing violence. Green is a powerful figure, who clearly has the most fun in the cast as she manipulates men and shows off her body.
Like the first film, this "Sin City" is made up of three full stories and a short one to open it, each focused on different characters — some of whom overlap in the other narratives. This worked extremely well when the segments were of about equal length and each act of the film was a full story. Here the pacing lacks such momentum, as "A Dame to Kill For" takes about an hour of the runtime and is only sometimes entertaining, although always visually interesting.
Its big finale disappoints too with the action feeling slapped together and a weak conclusion, further proof co-director Robert Rodriguez has lost his whiz-bang master touch.
The opening with Marv (Mickey Rourke), the hulking killer who leaves a swab of destruction wherever he goes, proves a fun way to give the fan favorite his due. Throughout the rest of the movie he only sporadically shows up for a few quips to fight and to kill henchmen with the other main characters, much of that violence being lazily executed.
The most successful, tightly wound and least over-the-top segment finds Johnny (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a cocky gambler who never loses, challenging the most powerful and corrupt man in the city, Senator Roark (Powers Boothe), in a game of poker. After winning, he has to face Roark's vindictive and nasty backlash, while his brazen integrity keeps him pushing back. Gordon-Levitt elevates everything he's in, and the David and Goliath angle makes this a satisfying investment.
The final story starts strong but, unsurprisingly, ends with a hollow assault of revenge against lots of bad guys. Nancy (Jessica Alba), Sin City's favorite stripper who Hartigan (Bruce Willis) saved in the first film, has become a drunk and obsesses over avenging Hartigan by killing Roark. The dark places this one goes at first, as Nancy crawls into her own deteriorating psyche and argues with Ghost Willis, prove dramatically captivating and poignant. But then Miller decided to throw that away with a silly (and ineffectual) action sequence that totally contradicts the "Sin City" timeline.
There are still things worth seeing in this messy city and stories worth telling, but altogether, they just add up to a disappointing return to a place where you've already experienced the best parts.
CROSSWORD
Edited by Casey Hutchins
ACROSS
1 Show-
room
sample
5 Paper
quantity
9 1-Across,
e.g.
12 Black-
and-white
cookie
13 Taj Mahal
city
14 Individual
15 Hallow-
een treat
17 Scepter
18 Dregs
19 "Ain't got
a clue"
21 Joust
weapons
24 Stupefy
25 Heroic
poetry
26 Group of
warships
30 Melody
31 Down East
32 Writer
Fleming
33 False
teeth
35 Pooch
36 Relaxation
37 Cold
rolled
food
38 — -frutti
40 Erstwhile acorns
42 Blackbird
43 Goat sign
48 "Monty Python" opener
49 Lend an illegal hand
50 Stead
51 Parcel of land
52 Lord's mate
53 "Desire Under the —"
DOWN
1 Elmer, to Bugs
2 Historic period
3 Chaps
4 Loads
5 "The
Amazing
—"
6 Hollywood
clashers
7 Timetable
abbr.
8 Authoritative order
9 "Planet
of the
Apes"
role
10 Soon,
poetically
11 Start over
16 "Of
course"
20 Submachine gun
21 Hoover
Dam lake
22 "... black-
birds,
baked
in —"
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THE ANSWERS
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23 Brass musician
24 Dresses in
26 Passenger's payment
27 Recline
28 Wood strip
29 Opposed
31 "Cats" or "Cabaret"
34 Tit for —
35 Strength
37 Tackle the slopes
38 Follow closely
39 "Do — others ..."
40 Essay pg.
41 Bohemian
44 Lawyers' org.
45 Lubricate
46 Sleep phenomenon, for short
47 Greek consonants
SUDOKU
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| 6 | | 1 | 3 | | 4 | 5 | 9 |
| | 8 | | | | | 6 | |
| | 3 | | 8 | | | 4 | |
| | | | 1 | 7 | | | |
| | 9 | | 2 | | | 5 | |
| | 1 | | | | | 9 | |
| 2 | | 5 | 8 | 9 | 3 | 1 |
| | | 6 | | | 4 | |
Difficultv Level ★★
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Today's Cryptoquip Clue: J equals T
SUPPORT FROM PAGE 1
"I thought that there was a lot of victim blaming going on,
feel like we're isolated from this, but... this is very much a real part of people's lives and I think sometimes we don't like to have difficult conversations," Kaminski said. "I also think it was important that everyone got to speak and express their feelings about it. That's why I made it more open."
Students like Austin Fisher, a senior from Lawrence, have been getting involved in the Ferguson story through other protests as well. Fisher helped organize a small protest on Aug. 17, where attendees used the human microphone, a protest tactic used in Occupy Wall Street in which the audience repeats parts of a speaker's speech for greater emphasis.
and I thought there were a lot of statements being made that were distracting from the real issue," Fisher said.
Fisher said the Aug. 17 protest was not limited to the killing of Michael Brown but also included police actions following including the release of Officer Darren Wilson's name, the footage of what happened and the treatment of journalists and peaceful protesters.
"The injustice wasn't just limited to the death of Michael Brown and the point of the protest wasn't just limited to the death of Michael Brown," Fisher said. "The point of the protests was to tell people, 'hey, this is a national issue. This issue has been a problem for the 400-year history of this country."
Edited by Miranda Davis
RECRUIT FROM PAGE 1
Long said
"Just because I didn't join a sorority doesn't mean that I can't be friends with the girls that I connected with," Tubbs said.
Madison Tubbs, a freshman from Colby, participated in recruitment this fall and although she didn't connect with every sorority, she made lasting friendships.
Tubbs was offered a bid and declined but said she is glad she experienced it.
"I think that it's a good opener into the year because you have to be able to make conversation with people," Tubbs said. "It helps you with answering questions that people are going to ask you a lot over the next three or four weeks or even probably your whole college career."
Alpha Chi Omega members meet their new sorority sisters at Kivisto Field parking lot on Friday.
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