300

Unabashed, no excuses, slap-you-in-the-face testosterone malegasm.  I can't sum up my feelings about 300 any better than this review from the Guardian, from noting how inaccurate and silly the film is,  to it being closer to Frank Miller's graphic novel than any traditional "sword and sandal" epic, to the video game aesthetic, and even how I enjoyed myself on some level despite the fact that I hated what the film stands for.  I felt that, unlike SIN CITY, this film had a good sense of itself and what it represents.  It has no pretensions about being an art film, or being really smart, or being award-worthy.  They're not even really trying to be revolutionary in terms of style.  They're just taking everything that has been done before, but doing it better and in a more focussed manner.  Make no mistake: there is no meandering here, the film gets right to the point.

The film is a culmination of a lot of trends in recent "cinema of the sensational": a comic book (a graphic novel is just a fancy name for an adult comic book) adaptation, medieval / fantasy epic, a recycled plot line "based on true events," the fetishization of violence through fast and slow motion (that for some reason is so much less offensive than sexuality), and the exaggerated use of a music video / video game aesthetic.  In so many ways, 300 is the perfect embodiment of the values that run rampant through Hollywood today.  I expect an onslaught of horrible 300 clones to follow for this very reason.

But the difference between 300 and its bevy of copycats will be that 300 did what it did extremely well.  Yes, it's superficial and can be interpreted as offensive on many levels, but it has so much fun doing it.  Yes the script is flimsy, especially the voice-over narration, but who needs words when your army is full of men who look so good?  The violence and action is at moments almost beautiful in its own distorted, ballet-like fashion (the Spartans and Greeks DID honor greatness on the battlefield after all), and occasionally the panoramic views inspire the awe of a moving renaissance painting.  The movie unleashes what all of us love about a violent video game or a stirring emotional war speech, but without pretending that it is anything we should actually bother to take seriously.  This movie is not BRAVEHEART or GLADIATOR, both which would have us believe they penetrate into truths of the human condition and inspire us with tales of freedom and love.  The movie is no LORD OF THE RINGS, which would have us believe that its Christian and mythological imagery elevate it to something more grand.  No, 300 is what most people really love in those films and nothing else: buff guys fighting invincible odds and looking really cool while they do it.  What we could have done without are the trappings and tired clichés of the genre: do all Greek and Roman lovers meet in wheat fields (GLADIATOR)?  Do all men call their wives "m'lady?"  And where are the Persians who are not demonic ogres with blades for arms? (LOTR, et al).  And please, please, please: the use of the word "freedom" in these attempts at historical epics is horribly awry, no matter how much American audiences love to cheer for it. 

Lest we forget, our proud king will remind us: "This IS SPARTA!!!!!!"