Sin City: A Dame to Kill For

No longer what it used to be. Maybe it’s because I managed to read Damn Big Sin City before watching (I couldn’t get my hands on the comic book before part 1) but it just didn’t have that great an impact on me. In quality terms, the stories are more or less the same. The Dame to Kill For is definitely the best part of this movie. Eva Green suits her role beautifully. The new story with Joe Levitt is excellent, but Jessica Alba as the vengeful Nancy not so much. It’s not a complete disaster, but it seems badly thought out to the end and too many things go suspiciously well. Overall fine, but the moment of surprise skedaddled. (09/22/2014)

Sin City 2 didn't impress me much. The visuals are again properly dark and original, adding two distinctive and perfect characters like Eva Green, whose tits haven't changed at all since 300: Rise of an Empire, and the very talented and perfect Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who really enjoyed his role and I'm with him, he just could have been given more space. What I see as a minus is the lack of blood, these white splashes don't impress much and overall I didn't have as much fun here as I did with the first one, so Sin City 2 doesn't take 4* from me. 65% (09/24/2014)

Slightly weaker than the previous film (what wasn't in the comics and what Frank Miller invented just for this film is really extraneous), but still a very good and stylish spectacle. It's not playing at anything, it wants to be gritty noir trash full of inner monologues, fatality, sex, and blood... and it is. (04/27/2019)

Pointless recycling of what we've seen before, but without any of the dramaturgical lightness and plot momentum of the unrivalled first film. The scenes are connected by rather flimsy bridges and the film as a whole doesn't escalate, surprise or even shock with a single bit of entertaining brutality, the kind the first one was packed to bursting with. The only thing that they managed to retain is the irresistible atmosphere of "sin and moral depravity" and the hilarity of Rourke's character, who’s amazing and could have carried the whole thing on his shoulders alone much, much better. This is just a dud, it can’t be denied... 50% (10/10/2015)

My relationship with film is best illustrated by the fact that I managed to avoid it for almost 8 years after its premiere. Rodriguez has never been among my favorite directors, and even in moments of weakness, I only gave him a maximum of 3 stars, and with the passing years, I feel that I am moving further away from his work. Therefore, today I am much stricter when it comes to his films. Since the first trip to Sin City, Rodriguez has not advanced anywhere, and he hasn't understood anything or learned anything new. In this film, we can once again witness the failure of narrative techniques and the pitiful inability to work with characters. The film quickly becomes an unintentional parody of itself. Miller's exaggeratedly affected comic book vision needed cinematic cultivation and sensitive development of its world, not mechanical takeover and cramping literalness. Rodriguez did not become a visionary, but rather a discoverer and advocate of a typical dead-end in filmmaking. If it weren't for the fetishistically seductive visuals and the presence of Eva Green, who lends her deceptive femme fatale with confidence and wit like no other actress, I would rate it even lower. Overall impression: 35%. (12/27/2021)