Part I: What's Better than Episode III - Other than nigh everything?

I would rather see this than Episode III.

But then again, I'd rather see a double feature of Glitter followed up with Vanilla Sky than see Episode III.

-DH

Sin City, Here We Come...

Well, took a long lunch (3 hours) to go check out Sin City today.

Okay. I liked it. I'm just not sure, at this point, exactly how much I liked it.

I never read any of the comics or graphic novels. So it was all new to me, which is a good thing.

Although it got me thinking - You need a certain type of actor to make bad dialog good.

Face it. The dark days of the original Film Noir was all about taking the predictable film 'Good Vs Evil' stereotype and turning it its ear. Flawed heroes. Strong women. Not just bad guys, but smart, deceitful bad guys. It was an era of grey filmed in black and white.

This wasn't about dialog. It was about a deeper, more animalistic emotion. The words were just icing.

Sin City was all about that.

And, lets face it, there were some horrific lines in that film.

The silencer makes a whisper of the gunshot. I hold her close until she's gone. I'll never know what she was running from. I'll cash her check in the morning.

Look at it in print without context, it's a big old literary WTF moment. But you don't notice it in the film at all.

And that's what it takes. You need an actor who can deliver lines like that with a straight face, but also with a tiny little wink. If you take it too seriously, it comes off like a bad soap opera. Joke it up too much, and you get melodrama. You've got actors that just do that (Bruce Willis, Mickey Roarke) and people who can act that way because they can just plain act (Clive Owen).

The movie just works on that level.

Oh. And there was a whole lotta real nice ass. All over the place. Carla Gugino has a really, really nice ass. And there is more than enough ass to go around for people who like feminine ass.

People who like masculine-ass will be really disappointed. Sorry.

-DH

My Brain: Not for the Weak.

I was thinking about rants a lot this week.

You know what I'm talking about. You start out slow, but build momentum, rattling out your rant. At the peak, it's almost like a demon gets into you. You face becomes rubber and flies all over the place as you spew out your venom. Afterwords, you're drained and tired, but you still feel so good.

Y'know. Like an orgasm.

-DH