Hollywood blockbuster Sin City on Wednesday topped a slate of violent films competing at the Cannes film festival, delivering a heavy dose of cartoonish savagery wrapped in groundbreaking visuals.
The flick, a contemporary take on film noir starring Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke, Clive Owen, Michael Madsen and Jessica Alba, impressed for its cutting edge black-and-white photography punctuated with startling flashes of colour, and its rough-house world peopled with tough-as-guts men and scantily-clad dames.
But the repeated scenes of castration, amputation, torture and death that filled out the entire movie, coupled with the decision of directors Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller to essentially make it a series of three short stories only tenuously linked, left audiences a little cold.
Miller, whose series of Sin City graphic novels served as the material - really the storyboards - for the movie, rejected allegations that he was promoting real-life violence through the movie.
"Violence is a real catchy buzzword these days... it's a bit ridiculous. As far encouraging anybody to commit violence, I don't believe in the monkey-see-monkey-do sort of violence," he said.
Rodriguez, who made the similarly gory "Once Upon a Time in Mexico" and who is to make another two Sin City films, concurred.
The movie was very "stylised," he said. "Sin City is a film noir which is about a darkness.... I don't see anybody ripping anybody's real balls off anytime soon (because of it)."
{{/usCountry}}The movie was very "stylised," he said. "Sin City is a film noir which is about a darkness.... I don't see anybody ripping anybody's real balls off anytime soon (because of it)."
{{/usCountry}}Willis was not present at Cannes, but the other members of the cast enthused about the final product.
"I think it's a seriously groundbreaking, highbrow movie," Owen, a fast-rising star in Hollywood action fare, said.
Rourke came in for particular praise from critics and fellow actors for his turn as a kind-hearted lug called Marv in one of the movie's tales, with the word going out that it may set him on the come-back trail.
"It's the greatest thing I've Mickey do in all his years of making movies," said Madsen, a regular cinematic tough-guy whose mentor and pop-schlock meister Quentin Tarantino also took part as 'special guest director' for one of the movie's scenes.
With all its excessive brutality, Sin City appeared to confirm a trend towards violence on film at Cannes this year.
Lemming, the French film that opened the event, set the tone with a suicide and a murder, but the stakes have been raised since in the competition line-up.
A History of Violence by Canada's David Cronenberg truly lived up to its title. Where the Truth Lies by fellow Canadian Atom Egoyan added a lot of sex to the mix.
Election by Hong Kong director Johnni To gave the bloodshed an Asian twist. Even Shanghai Dreams by Chinese director Wang Xiaoshuai had its stark moments, notably with a rape and an execution.
Out of competition, Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of the Sith took George Lucas's penchant for amputation to a new level, and Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang starring Val Kilmer and Robert Downey Jr. won raves for its humour, though the bodycount was hefty.tertainment-film-Cannes-US-SinCity.