300

Directed By Zack Snyder

Starring Gerard Butler, Lena Headey

Frank Miller, if you didn't already know, is one of the greatest writer/illustrators in the comic book industry.  He's flirted with Hollywood many times over the years and gotten burned to the point he vowed never to return.  He'd just stick to doing what he does best, comic books.  Well, Robert Rodriguez convinced him to give film, not Hollywood per se, another chance with a big screen rendition of Sin City. Miller was brought in to co-direct with Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, who only helmed one scene.  Thus, a classic film, and one of the most innovative in years, was born.

The Movie

When something as innovative as Sin City comes along it's bound to be imitated, and it has with this new film from Zack Snyder called 300.  Now Zack was smart, if you're going to imitate a film based on a Frank Miller book then you have to get the rights to another Frank Miller book, which is exactly what he did.  300 is a graphic novel Miller wrote about the battle of Thermopylae.  Snyder decided to do as Rodriguez did by doing a literal interpretation of the graphic novel, even using the books images as storyboards and he decided to do the entire film indoors with blue screens creating everything other than the actors with CG (well actually some of the actors are CG too).

The story, such as it is goes like this; King Leonidas is approached by Persians who want to make a deal with him to give up his throne and his lands and become a warlord for them.  Leonidas is a Spartan, and he takes pride in what his people have built and refuses to deal and plans to fight any attempted invasion.  His council (some mutated dudes and a half naked chick) tell him that they will fail.  Their law is to follow what they are told by these freaks so no war will be waged.

Leonidas decides to take a walk, and he takes 300 bodyguards with him who just happen to be some of the best Spartan warriors in their army.  The night before he is too leave his Queen gives it up to him Shannon Tweed style.

The 300 plan to catch the Persians, who outnumber them by the thousands in a bottleneck where they believe that numbers don't matter.  The meet another band of warriors determined also to stop the Persians.  While these warriors number many more than the Spartans they are all civilians, not real trained warriors.  At any rate they band together and make for the rendezvous point.

From here on out it's all about eye candy, big violent battles, pounding chests, and smartass remarks.  It's pure popcorn entertainment.

Miller writes for the uber-man, everything Leonidas says and does is badass.  By the end of this film I was asking myself if I was really a man.  One of these Spartans is more of a man than virtually every man I know combined and it's exhilarating to watch them do there thing, even if the end is inevitable.  Since Miller does write from this megaman perspective women often don't get the fairest shake.  I remember how many reviewers called Sin City misogynistic. Like in that story, and the film, there is a female hero here and she uses her abilities just as the warrior men use theirs.  She uses her body to try and get support for her husband's crusade, sleeping with a couple of dues on his court.  One of those men is a friend but the other one disagrees with Leonidas and wants rid of him so after he gets what he wants from her he turns on her, but she's a tough woman and paybacks area bitch.

This is more Clash of the Titans than Gladiator.  While the book and this film are taken from Greek mythology, and even a few of the one liners exited in that original telling, everything here is pumped up for pure entertainment value with giant mutated monsters, magic, and super human warriors ready to fight.  Don't take this wrong because I'm not complaining, in fact just the opposite.  I had a complete blast with this movie.  There were a few one liners that were clunkers but overall it's machismo on 11 and it's an adrenaline pumping popcorn celebration.

Fight scenes, of which there are many, are shot mostly in slow motion allowing Snyder to render blood spatter and character appearance as close to those in the book as possible.  There are some other scenes where the entire army works together in defense that awe inspiring too.  I'm happy to see the "let's cut the fight scenes so quick you can't see what's happening, and oh lets put a strobe light on it too" style of shooting fights nowhere to be found in this film.  There's no point to having a fight scene if you shoot and cut it so spastically the audience can't see what's going on and when they try they get a roaring headache.  Are you listening Chronicles of Riddick?  I will say this as far as the individual character fight scenes go, once you've seen one you've seen them all.  They don't get more impressive in some way as the movie progresses, there's just more of the same on that level.  But, as I watched it I didn't seem to have a problem with that because what you get is fun from beginning to end.

I have to talk a bit about the look of the film.  Snyder and crew went a long way to try and reproduce the look and feel of the graphic novel and they get some mixed results.  The things I appreciated the most are some of the more subtle visual cues.  There's a scene for example in the beginning when Leonidas is leaving and he fades out of focus in the background with the Queen looking sad in the foreground.  The characters don't move but the lighting changes on her face giving the scene more emotional impact.  This is lifted right from the Miller book and Snyder uses this trick a few times in the film.  Scenes inside buildings look great but the scenes outside feel a bit claustrophobic.  I know our characters have set the battle up this way but what I mean is nothing seems to exist within a few feet of the characters even though it is rendered on screen.  This situation was actually handled much better in Sin City.  The look is beautiful though, and it does feel like a comic book come to life.

Other than my complaints about the look, the characters don't have much depth either.  In the long run Sin City will still be remembered as the best Frank Miller adaptation but 300 will be one of those films you throw in for a night of pure fun.

8/10

-Stephen Lackey