300

I saw 300 last weekend at WonderCon (yes, I was one of the lucky winners!), and while I'm not going to give you a super-detailed review/commentary with lots of screen-caps and other fancy-schmancy stuff like that, I will take this brief discussion below the jump.



For the most part, I enjoyed the movie. There were things I really liked and things I just didn't really care for. I'm just going to talk about a few of them below here. In a list. Because I like lists:

1. I'm just going to get this out of the way, but MAN, Gerard Butler looks good in the outfit (such as it is). I don't feel like it detracts from my manlihood to say so, either. The rest of the cast is Pretty, too (at least the ones that are supposed to be), but Butler owns the screen when he's on it...

2. I liked the additional storyline about what was going on in Sparta/why the army didn't show up to help Leonidas. I thought the interplay between Queen Gorgo and Senator Thurmond (or whatever his name was) was, while vicious, also accurate (or at least as accurate as we can imagine a conversation between 2 long-dead historical characters conversing in their native tongue).

3. I really, REALLY like that Matrix-style, bullet-time stuntwork. There are points in the movie where Snyder just really does a super job of controlling the pace of these effects. Superlative effects, folks...

4. I have to confess that the shot in the beginning of the 7 year-old Leonidas was pounding the face in of some other kid disturbed me. I'm not saying it should be removed from the film, but considering how violent many of the schools in this country are, it just seemed an interesting choice to include in the film. I also, btw, concede that the image does a good job emphasizing some things about Spartan society to the viewer: the importance of...loyaly to Sparta and to the Spartan ideal (or the ideal of any society, really), and HOW hardcore do you have to be, as a society, where you'll throw away any defective infant? That takes more nerve than I've got, I guess.

I've got a few more thoughts on the film but it's getting late and I've got a lot of writing yet to do. Perhaps tomorrow or Sunday...