Comic-book burlesque of the hard-boiled film noir, tougher than tough, cooler than cool, bloodier than bloody, sillier than silly. Robert Rodriguez adapted it -- or more accurately, copied it -- from Frank Miller's series of graphic novels; and he insisted, to the point of resigning from the Director's Guild, on sharing the directing credit with Miller (besides bringing in his buddy, Quentin Tarantino, as a "guest director" of unspecified services). Different first-person narrators guide us through the different, dovetailed storylines, but always with the same hammerhead tone of voice: "I'm gonna find that son of a bitch that killed you, and I'm gonna give him the hard goodbye." The baroque black-and-white photography, with digital dabs of color for a red dress, green eyes, blue eyes, golden hair, blood, etc., may at first be "visually arresting" (thank you, Newsweek), but over the long haul it's visually imprisoning. Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke, Clive Owen, Benecio Del Toro, Jessica Alba, Brittany Murphy, Carla Gugino, Jaime King, Rosario Dawson, Alexis Bledel, Michael Madsen, Elijah Wood, Nick Stahl, Powers Boothe. (2005) — Duncan Shepherd
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