Co-directed with Miller, "Sin City" takes the viewer on a close-up tour of Basin City where some of the roughest of comic characters live and breathe. There's Marv, played by Mickey Rourke, a gargoyle of a man who kills at will, but has a soft spot for an exotic dancer named Goldie. There's also Hartigan played by Bruce Willis, a good cop about to retire except that he has to go through Hell first and help a little girl named Nancy. Throw in Clive Owen as Dwight, a photographer who is out to protect yet another woman from a psychotic cop played by Benicio del Toro and you have most of the story line of this flick.

Plenty of gravelly-throated narrative links the plots together in a visual style that seems to ooze black ink. Occasional elements such as blood or a woman's dress glow with color to emphasize the action and give the movie a look of its own. Powers Boothe, Rutger Hauer and even Elijah Wood make cameo appearances, all of them wonderfully unlikable characters. Wood's cannibalistic Kevin is one of the highlights of the story. This is a strange netherworld of a movie, but it packs a punch that will send you flying through the back wall of the theatre.

The audience for the matinee I attended was mostly guys, college age and older, although there were a couple of teenage boys with their fathers. This is a movie for guys who like movies. It's not a date movie by any means, unless you are going out with a really tough dame.

Ultra-violent, darkly funny, and hugely entertaining, "Sin City" has finally made it OK to head