Only a fool would miss Sin City tomorrow

This ain't no regular moving picture, and it ain't the kind of film your parents are gonna enjoy.

Instead, Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez's Sin City takes the audience back to 1991, down a two-lane blacktop to a fictional metropolis called Basin City, or Sin City for short.

From the very first digital frame of the story, we penetrate deeper into this black-and-white world Miller created on the page and Rodriguez quite deftly brings to life. The opening scenes are actually the original short film Rodriguez used as a test film to convince Miller to come on board.

As we follow the filmmaker down the rabbit hole, we're literally drawn into Miller's world. It's highly stylized in black and white -- with a bit of carefully placed color. Rodriguez calls the film a "translation" (not an adaptation) of three graphic novels by Frank Miller; Sin City, That Yellow Bastard and The Big Fat Kill.

Devoid of real heroes, the town holds in check the desperate lives of its inhabitants. Let's take a look at a few of them.

Hartigan (Bruce Willis) is a broken-down cop with a score to settle. Marv (Mickey Rourke) just can't seem to get a break, and the law is breathin' down his neck after his girl is killed. Clive Owen's Dwight is busy cleaning up the town, one dirty cop at a time. But here, there's always a price to pay. The cast is filled out with dangerous women and men, their character flaws reading like rap sheets.

Miller at first wasn't keen on letting anyone put the Hollywood touch on his stories, but Rodriguez eventually won him over. Every epic, high-definition shot was ripped directly from the inked page. Miller and Rodriguez deliver their pulp-fiction storytelling style, dropping us right in the midst of the action -- and everyone's got a story to tell. But the images are what send this film over the top.

German-style expressionism never had it so good, with hard, dark lines of shadow, and stark, two dimensionality draping every scene and character rendered on screen. This film succeeds where so many other comic-book films fail.

How effective is the use of black and white? This isn't the first time. Quentin Tarantino (who guest directs here) dropped color from his climactic violence fest of a scene in Kill Bill as the blood flowed, keeping it from going sour.

Miller colorized the occasional pair of red lips, pool of blood, speeding car and, of course, the Yellow Bastard character. Rodriguez explains in a press release that he could use color as a weapon, enhancing a character's pain by isolating and coloring an object. And just like in the comics, he was able to use white against the drab blackness to its fullest effect.

Rodriguez did more than that to retain what he thought was vital to the original. He resigned from the Directors Guild of America (giving up the right to direct a 2006 Paramount film) so he could give Miller a co-director credit. Rodriguez also let Tarantino guest direct an extended sequence in the storyline for "A Big Fat Kill" with Owen and Del Toro.

For a man who started his career at 23 with a $7,000 film (El Mariachi), Rodriguez has given audiences another page in a remarkable life. Don't miss this one.