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Sin City (2005)
Also, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014)
In director Robert Rodriguez' violent, carnage-filled
film (with cannibalism, dismemberment, mutilation, castration and more!)
- it was a bloody and ultra-stylistic noirish monochromatic (with splashes
of color) - a noirish representation of Frank Miller's graphic, comic-book
novels with three overlapping, cross-cut hard-boiled stories set in
dark, corrupted and rain-slick Basin City.
- in the film's pre-credits opening ("The Customer
is Always Right"), a doomed, suicidal red dress-wearing dame known
as Customer (Marley Shelton) stood on a terrace high above the
cold, teeming city - to be kissed and then killed by The Man/Salesman
(Josh Hartnett), whom she had supposedly hired as a hit man; after
killing her with a silencer-gun, he mentioned that he would cash
her check in the morning
- in the next tale "That Yellow Bastard" (the first
of two parts), disgraced, heart-failing retiring -cop John Hartigan
(Bruce Willis) saved young 11 year-old Nancy Callahan (Makenzie
Vega as youth, Jessica Alba as adult) from depraved serial-killing
pedophile Roark Jr.'s (Nick Stahl) rape and murder at the docks;
Junior was one of Basin City's protected criminals - the son of
Senator Roark (Powers Boothe)
- in the second part of the story (much later in the
film), after a deadly shoot-out between Hartigan and Roark, Jr.,
Hartigan was put on trial by Senator Roark and framed for Junior's
crimes; he was put in jail and solitary confinement
for 8 years. After his parole release, Hartigan relocated Nancy,
now 19 years old, and was stunned to learn that she was performing
as an exotic stripper (in a cowgirl outfit) in Kadie's Bar. He
realized that it was a trap - he had been released to lead the forces
of evil to Nancy; he was then pursued by the deformed, smelly and
disfigured Roark, Jr., now known as Yellow Bastard. Again, Hartigan
protected Nancy from the Yellow Bastard and brutally killed him (first
by stabbing and then ripping off his genitals), but then suicidally
took his own life to ensure Nancy's future safety
Hartigan (Bruce Willis)
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Nancy (Jessica Alba)
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Roark Jr. - aka Yellow Bastard (Nick Stahl)
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- in another storyline known as "The Hard Goodbye,"
tough ex-con, thuggish, Frankenstein-like street fighter Marv (Mickey
Rourke) sought revenge against psycho-serial killer Kevin (Elijah
Wood) for the Roark-instigated murder of his blonde hooker-lover
Goldie (Jaime King); after having sex and sleeping with her in a
red heart-shaped bed, he awoke to find her dead; Marv was set up
and framed for the crime
- Marv met with Lucille (Carla Gugino), his
lesbian parole officer, who was abruptly awakened from bed, topless,
and brandished her gun at him, and strutted around wearing a brief
thong; he told her he was in pursuit of the one
responsible for Goldie's death; he discovered that the person behind
the crime was powerful Cardinal Patrick Henry Roark (Rutger Hauer),
the brother of Senator Roark (Lucille was also preyed upon by Kevin,
and eventually lost her life when gunned down by police.)
Marv (Mickey Rourke)
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Kevin (Elijah Wood)
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Wendy (Jaime King) - Goldie's Twin Sister
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- Marv went after silent, creepy, cannibalistic serial
killer Kevin - who had decapitated many other Basin City prostitutes;
after Marv's fight to the death with Kevin, as he urged: "Is
that the best you can do, creep?", Marv tortured and dismembered
Kevin, and then propped him up against a tree, after his arms and
legs were sawed off and tied off with rubber tubing tourniquets.
Kevin was then devoured by a meat-eating wolf (Kevin's own pet wolf).
Afterwards, the exasperated Marv cut Kevin's head off with a saw
- and stood there with the decapitated head in his left hand
Kevin With Arms and Legs Sawed Off
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Approach of Kevin's Meat-Eating Wolf
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Kevin's Death
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Marv Holding Kevin's Decapitated Head
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- Marv also killed Cardinal Roark, the Senator's brother
and the one responsible for Goldie's murder. In the bleak ending,
Marv accepted his death sentence by execution in the electric chair
for the murders of Kevin and Cardinal Roark (and for all their crimes
as well). Before his death, Goldie's twin sister Wendy (also Jaime
King) thanked Marv for avenging Goldie's death
- a third tale ("The Big Fat Kill") was about Sin City photographer and
PI Dwight McCarthy (Clive Owen) who angered abusive Jackie Boy (Benicio
Del Toro) - because he had begun dating Jackie Boy's girlfriend Shellie
(Brittany Murphy); the prostitutes in Old Town were led by Dwight's
sometime-lover Gail (Rosario Dawson), where Dwight followed and watched
as Jackie Boy began threatening one of the other prostitutes named
Becky (Alexis Bledel); leather-clad dominatrix, vigilante leader
Gail with an Uzi machine-gun was in a turf war with the streetwalkers
against corrupt cops, one of whom was abusive Jackie Boy
- silent female martial arts expert Miho (Devon Aoki), one
of Old Town's prostitute defenders and protectors along with Gail,
also had been battling against Jackie Boy; Jackie Boy ended up
dead from his own backfiring gun; Dwight discovered that Jackie Boy
was actually Det. Lt. "Iron
Jack" Rafferty, a Basin City police officer; if it was learned that the cop had been
killed in Old Town, war would be waged on the prostitutes by the
mob and Irish mercenaries
- meanwhile, the traitorous
Becky had sold out Old Town by betraying the prostitutes to the mob
after the killing of Jackie Boy, for money and to ensure her mother's
safety from the mob. Gail was kidnapped by mob enforcer Manute (Michael
Clarke Duncan) and held for ransom before an all-out assault and gun
battle; Dwight was able to intervene and free Gail and kill Manute,
while the other prostitutes gunned down the remaining mob-mercenaries,
as the injured Becky fled; in the short finale, Becky was confronted by the hit-man Salesman in a
hospital elevator - she was about to be assassinated for betraying
the prostitutes
- each of the three main characters died
for unselfish reasons: (1) Hartigan to protect Nancy, (2) Marv to
avenge Goldie's murder, and to protect Wendy and other prostitutes,
and (3) Becky to protect her mother from the mob
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The Opening - Doomed 'Customer" (Marley Shelton)
on Terrace Before Her Murder
19 Year-Old Exotic Stripper Nancy (Jessica Alba) with
Hartigan (Bruce Willis)
Nancy Threatened by the Yellow Bastard
Hartigan's Self-Sacrificial Suicide
The Death of Hooker Goldie (Jaime King), Marv's Lover
Lucille (Carla Gugino), Marv's Lesbian Parole Officer
Marv (Mickey Rourke) Confronting Serial-Killer Kevin (Elijah
Wood)
Sin City Photographer Dwight McCarthy (Clive Owen)
Shellie (Brittany Murphy) - Jackie Boy's Girlfriend
Old Town Prostitute Leader Gail (Rosario Dawson)
Death of Jackie Boy (Benicio Del Toro) From Backfiring Gun
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