Posted on 03/10/2007 9:13:49 AM PST by LdSentinal
What's your favourite movie?
Someday soon, you may ask a new acquaintance that question, and just maybe -- because it takes all kinds -- your new friend will reply, "My favourite movie is 300."
If this happens, back away slowly. Your new friend probably kills cats for fun. Worse -- your new friend may be George W. Bush. Director Zack Snyder's new dramatization of the epic Spartan stand at Thermopylae will probably go down real well at the White House, and wherever disturbed young people massacre hundreds in violent video games. Others should exercise discretion. This is a historical epic, but its real history is not so much ancient Greek as recent comic book. 300 is another film taken from the work of graphic novel auteur Frank Miller, following very much in the CGI tradition of last year's Miller-inspired Sin City. Nothing in 300 is natural -- not a ray of honest sunlight falls on a single frame of the movie. Like Sin City and the execrable Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, 300 was filmed entirely in front of blue screens and subsequently built around the actors digitally.
Pretty dumb
It's certainly better than Sky Captain, visually at least. 300 has an undeniable beauty, a burnished look intended to evoke the mythic. Think of the dream scenes in Gladiator and imagine a whole movie of that. Don't imagine much else, because you'll be disappointed. Someday, somebody is going to make one of these comic book movies that isn't quite so depressingly comic book. Not this time. 300 is an adolescent wet dream to its very core, a homoerotic paean to half-naked Greeks and their bloody, thrusting swords. And to make all the Chippendales-style posing more palatable for the young straight male target audience, there's a little bit of rough doggie-style hetero sex too.
The plot -- don't blink now -- is this: 300 brave Spartans, led by the heroic Leonidas (Gerard Butler), guard a pass against the Persian hordes commanded by King Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro). There's a small bit of politics thrown in, and the aforementioned boinking (featuring Lena Headey as Queen Gorgo). But it's mostly just the glorious, sexual thrill of slow-motion violence and orgasmic geysers of spurting blood. Really. Such unabashed tributes to slaughter are usually delivered with a wink in slasher films, but 300 does not know how to wink. It is deadly serious in the way that so often provokes giggles.
Certain parallels
There's virtually no development of the Persian side, almost no real sense of who they are and why they are so scary -- except that there's a whole lot of them, and their leader Xerxes is seven feet tall, like Darth Vader and with pretty much the same voice. When it finally arrives, the big sacrificial climax doesn't even make a lot of sense. It's just heroic. Regardless, 300 will likely be a masturbatory experience for the Ann Coulter crowd. Cruel, militaristic Sparta is the ideal; weak, artsy Athens is mocked, particularly in a scene where Athenian soldiers are revealed to be potters, sculptors, poets. Brave men who leave what they love to defend their country? Bah! Weaklings, according to this flick. As a tribute to a particular world view, 300 could play on a double bill with Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will.
And no doubt it will be screened at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. President Bush will certainly relish a film in which King Leonidas tries, and fails, to get authorization from Sparta's governing council for an attack against the forces of Persia, a.k.a. modern-day Iran. Leonidas goes ahead anyway. History calls him a hero. So much for congressional funding.
There's even evidence that the film consciously grasps at this clash-of-civilizations message. "Today we will rid the world of mysticism and tyranny," shouts a Greek soldier, leading a charge against the Persians moments after we have seen an image of dead Spartans in Christ-like poses.
Most of the bloodthirsty teens in the audience won't care about that stuff, of course. But Dick Cheney will cream himself. I guess Dick can use a little diversion. He's had a rough year.
Yeah, I tried that a few times but the SPCA started getting wise.
"...be a masturbatory experience for the Ann Coulter crowd."
"But Dick Cheney will cream himself."
Who talks like this? The writer is obviously projecting his own perversions.
Burgess is obsessed with masturbation and homosexuality. It appears the movie has precipitated an episode of classic homosexual panic during pre-genital stage psycho-sexual development.
Interesting.
I've heard from two lefty co-workers so far that LOVED this movie!
(I guess they didn't get the memo)
For example, it appears that Burgess may be uncomfortable about his own sexuality and perhaps is afraid of his own homosexual tendencies.
Clearly this article (written by an 'unknown') is a cry for attention from his idol Ann Coulter.
Most likely, Steve Burgess was not permitted to read comic books when he was a kid, which might explain why he doesn't "get it".
He manages to work both the Nazis and George Bush into a "review" of a film that is about neither, which is a common symptom of full-fledged Bush Derangement Syndrome.
Burgess identifies strongly with potters, sculptors, and poets, and in true Walter Mitty fashion, believes that he is one of those "brave men" who would go so far as to take up arms to defend his country (even though, yuck, guns are icky and he's scared of them), but at the same time believes that members of the US National Guard who do exactly that are warmongers and baby killers. Etc.
From their point of view it's those illiterate Americans who haven't been able to spell since Noah Webster screwed up American dictionaries. So deal.
"Someday, somebody is going to make one of these comic book movies that isn't quite so depressingly comic book."
I have actually read much of the comic (unlike the reviewer, I suspect) and found it to be an enjoyable story. At no point does the book represent itself as anything other than a fictional account of a historical event. Of course, leftie movie reviewers are already reality-challenged and it is no surprise that they don't get it.
This guy has some real issues. Pets and small children should be kept away from him.
I was hearing a lot of masochistic orgasmic moans of delight from the Bill Maher types in attendance.
Funny how leftwingers turn into angry little Sigmund Freuds when they review movies with rightwing themes.
He had me at "orgasmic geysers of spurting blood"
From their point of view it's those illiterate Americans who haven't been able to spell since Noah Webster screwed up American dictionaries. So deal.
I think there was a pleasant message delivered here. The leader of the Senate (an obvious Demicrat-ick liberal - ha ha) promised the wife of Leonidas he would support her if she had sex with him. She complied, putting the needs of her husband and her nation above her own. Of course, the liberal Senate leader lied, and betrayed her, blaming her for the incident. She then took a sword and ran him through with it. THAT, was a very GOOD message!
Half my ancestry is Spartan. Can I sue Mr Burgess for a hate crime?
One of the points was that a General and his brave men were far away fighting for their liberties. The Senate called it "his war" and dithered about sending him aid. Now which members of the America's Senate does that bring to mind? (Yesterday on Hannity & Colmes, in talking about the war Colmes phrased it as "George Bush and his henchmen."
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