Gordon open up a second front of villainy back home as wily politician Theron (Dominic West) manipulates the council against sending reinforcements and crudely takes Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) sexually. Snyder and his writers Kurt Johnstad and Michael B. The Persians, by contrast, are dressed in all sorts of jewels, peacock color, gold, purple, black - a hooker’s ball of exotic, foreign and decadent costumes. The 300 are doomed yet die “beautiful deaths.”Īdapting Miller’s take on Spartan battle wear, Snyder and costume designer Michael Wilkinson strip the warriors down to essentials: a helmet, shield, red capes, loin cloths and scandals in warm colors. The god-king tries unsuccessfully to seduce Leonidas in a homoerotic passage as the ancient world stands still.īut it is a deformed and pathetic creature, Ephialtes (Andrew Tiernan), an outcast Spartan, who betrays the 300 by showing Xerxes a hidden path leading behind Spartan lines. Then comes Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) himself, a bejeweled, depraved giant carried on a high tower by his slaves. Snyder instinctively knows when to shift to slow motion or quick stop-action to catch the brilliant athleticism of his fighting choreography. The stage is thus set for a cinematic meal: A succession of charges by Persian forces - slave warriors, physical oddities, African animals, magic wizards and an elite guard called the Immortals in black Darth Vader masks - is slaughtered by the 300. Here the vast numbers of the enemy count for little since only a few can go up against Sparta’s best at any one time. So Leonidas has little choice but to “take a stroll” to the north with 300 of his best warriors as “bodyguards.” He chooses to engage the Persians in the Thermopylae pass, a narrow corridor between the steep cliffs of the Aegean Sea. The Oracle refuses to release the Spartan army to its ruler as no battle can occur during an upcoming religious celebration. This consists of beautiful young and drugged women controlled by sickly, corrupt priests. Leonidas kills the messengers.īut political opportunism rules the Spartan Council, which insists that Leonidas consult the Oracle. Messengers from the Persian army arrive in Sparta, arrogantly offering either capitulation or annihilation. Its sole survivor, Dilios (David Wenham), is the one who narrates the tale. The film’s hero, King Leonidas (Gerard Butler), has lived his entire life to fight this battle against the Persians. A prologue swiftly establishes the austere warrior city-state of Sparta, whose men are trained from birth to fight, to never retreat and never surrender. is a land truly favored by the gods, bathed in rich, harmonious dark chocolate, beige and gray colors. The film, which opens domestically March 9, will attract a sizable worldwide audience, skewering heavily male, of course.
The designed look of this alternative world, the abstraction and beauty of its topography, colors and forms, open up the human action to larger-than-life deeds and grand gestures that in a more realistic context would be pure camp. In epic battle scenes where he combines breathtaking and fluid choreography, gorgeous 3-D drawings and hundreds of visual effects, director Zack Snyder puts onscreen the seemingly impossible heroism and gore of which Homer sang in “The Iliad.” A raging hero mowing down multitudes with sword, shield and spear suddenly seems plausible. Those turned off by the sex-and-violence cartoonery of “Sin City” can embrace “300,” which screened out of competition here. Here, according to the graphic novel by Miller and Lynn Varley, 300 Spartan warriors went up against the barbarous hordes of the Persian god-king Xerxes and died valiantly defending Greek notions of freedom and justice. Instead of the neo-noir, pulp-fiction theater of cruelty in the Robert Rodriguez’s 2005 film “Sin City,” “300” dives into the mythology of the ancient Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C. REUTERS/Gene BlevinsīERLIN (Hollywood Reporter) - The Frank Miller experience continues in “300.” This is the second movie to transfer a muscular story and visuals from a Miller graphic novel to the screen. The new movie "300" is the second movie to transfer a muscular story and visuals from a Miller graphic novel to the screen.
Comic book writer Frank Miller shows his Comic-Con Icon award backstage at Spike TV's Scream Awards 2006 at the Pantages Theater in Hollywood, California in this Octofile photo.
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