Frank Miller, “A Dame to Kill For”
As great as a guy that Joe, host of all that is nothing (enterprises) is, you can’t help but slightly hate the little fucker.
Not for anything that he is, but for what he does. Joe is one of those people that have too much fucking talent. The guy can draw and paint on a fantastic level. He can pick up and play any kind of instrument, usually better than most people I know who have practiced for years. He wrote a book and did all the artwork himself. He’s been in seven hundred million bands, most of which he started himself. And between all that, he still manages to get drunk.
After my graduation, which coincided with the final night of Katie Bloom’s being open for business, I couldn’t move for two days. Sometimes the only thing it seems like Joe can’t do is utilize a spell check. He’s a tireless artistic freak, and he has to be stopped.
Joe is kind of like Frank Miller in fact, in regards to energy and artistry, not for the lack of a spell check. Miller can write and draw an entire series (e.g. Sin City, where this collection originally appeared in), while writing for a half-dozen other projects, and still having time to appear in the Daredevil movie to be killed by his own creation, Bullseye.
I bet this guy can play drums better than I can as well, and if he can’t, I bet if somebody gave him a drum kit he would be better than me within two weeks. However, if I can take comfort in small acts of pettiness, the entire Sin City series is presented in black and white, since he utilizes that noir look with a lot of heavy blacks forming boundaries, and the picture presented in white (there’s some kind of term for this art style, but dammed if I know what it is. I bet Joe knows...)
I’m hoping this means Miller can’t color for shit, but I’m betting that’s not the case.
Anyhoo, it would stand to reason that something that has such noir-ish art, would have a noir-ish story behind it, no? Yes! From the femme fatale, to the clueless lummox, this is paint-by-number noir fiction. Except that it’s really good — though if it came sans artwork I’m not sure I would have liked it as much as I did. Bottom line, this was like reading a Jim Thompson novel, except with pretty pictures. And now I have a real hankering to read some Jim Thompson.
But first, I think I need to challenge Joe to a game of Catan, since I know I’m better than him at that.
