The Departed's William Monahan Writing SIN CITY 2!

Oscar winning writer takes a second pass on Frank Miller's screenplay and Robert Rodriguez claims filming on the forever-gestating sequel could happen as early as this year.

By Matt Holmes / August 29, 2011

When he's not not calling James Toback to say he is remaking his 1974 film The Gambler, the Oscar winning The Departed screenwriter William Monahan is busy writing in the murky depths of Sin City! In the most significant announcement on Sin City 2 in years, The Hollywood Reporter say Monahan will revise Frank Miller's long worked on screenplay which director Robert Rodriguez, badly in need of a hit after a string of flops (most recently Spy Kids 4), said recently would roll in front of camera's soon, perhaps even before the year is out. In fact here's Rodriguez's exact quote;

There is a scenario where Frank has written a script for Sin City 2... Its called A Dame to Kill For because were kind of following the structure of the first movie where theres three stories and a wraparound. So one of the stories will be A Dame To Kill For, and another one will be a new story that Franks written. Its called The Long, Bad Night, so you get an idea of what youre in store for. The script is terrific; were still working on it, but there is a scenario where it could be shot as early as this year. If its going to happen, its going to happen this year. as soon as the script is ready. If the script was ready right now, wed be casting right now, the director elaborated. Were doing another pass on the script and as soon as its ready, we can actually shoot that. So its really, the holdup isnt anything but, again, story and characters. People have waited so long weve got to make sure its really great and its the best version we can do.

So that second pass Monahan is undertaking right now is to presumably to make Miller's writings feel a little more structured and suited to film. The original Sin City opened over six years ago now and grossed nearly $160 million worldwide before all was said and done. The film has a big cult following and one that has long cried out for a sequel and finally after years of budget/scheduling trouble, it looks like it's going to happen. Sin City will be based on three interlocking and connecting stories, just like the original. A Dame To Kill For is being adapted, a prequel to the previous events, so obviously Clive Owen will return as Dwight and Mickey Rourke as Marv (they both appear in that story) and obviously a titular dame is needed! At one point the idea was to cast Angelina Jolie in the role of Ava, the ultimate femme fatale and she would certainly tick our boxes for the part! The other two stories would be completely original non-comics tales from Miller, one of which has been confirmed to be a revenge story centered around Jessica Alba's Nancy avenging Hartigans (Bruce Willis) death by killing off the rest of the Roark family. This presumably is 'The Long, Bad Night' that is spoken of above. The third story is anyone's guess but as Rosario Dawson and has also been long touted for a return and pretty much everyone else who survived the original, plus with the ability to prequelize the stories there could be an open season on returning players if schedules/interest allow. One sour note is that Rodriguez wants to shoot the black & white green screen movie in 3D which we could do without but we will take Sin City 2 in 3D than no Sin City at all.