Yet as visually dazzling as '300' is (and to be sure, there's not a boring moment in this film), after an overlong 118 minutes a certain sense of overkill begins to dull one's senses. But while each of these concerns are certainly valid, ultimately they all get crushed under the sheer thrill of Snyder and Miller's bombast and spectacle. Upon its theatrical release, reviewers leveled a number of criticisms at '300': some said that it was gratuitously violent others felt that its characters were paper thin to the point of abstraction and still others felt that it was either the most homoerotic mainstream movie ever made or the most misogynist. The result is something like a cross between an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog, 'Ben Hur' and "Grand Theft Auto" - only ten times as loud.
It's all heaving bare flesh, strategically-placed costume details, and bold, digitally drawn-in backgrounds. Snyder both plays up the fantastical while also stripping the imagery down to its bare essentials. Miller turned his Persian warriors into a bizarre, surreal stew of iconic archetypes - from deformed warriors to bizarre African animals, raging wizards to the elite guard of the Immortals (complete with scary death masks right out of a 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' movie). As they come through the pass, Leonidas and his army will clobber them, one by one.Īnd so the stage is set for '300's almost non-stop second act cavalcade of phantasmagorical violence, bone-crushing gore and CGI wizardry. The plan is to limit the Persians' access, thereby making their massive numbers meaningless. Leonidas has the messengers slaughtered, and decides to amass his 300-strongĪrmy at Thermopylae pass, a narrow corridor between the steep cliffs of the Aegean Sea. He gets his chance after a group of arrogant messengers from the Persian army arrive in Sparta, offering its people the choice between surrender or death. King Leonidas (Gerard Butler) is the ostensible hero, who (in very Russell Crowe/Maximus style) has dreamed his entire life of defeating the Persians. The characters were only thinly sketched-out in the graphic novel, and they're only slightly more embellished in Snyder's vision.
(Feel free to insert your own "For the glory of Rome!" joke here.) As retold by Miller and Varley, approximately 300 Spartan warriors go up against the vicious hordes of Persian king Xerxes - all dying valiantly to defend the Greek ideals of freedom and justice. Working with his co-scenarist Lynn Varley, Miller traded in the pulpy, neo-noir of 'Sin City' for the the blustery, sword clanging majesty of the ancient Battle of Thermopylae. Using every trick of the modern cinema trade to not only bring Miller's comic book panels to life, but to elevate them even further to the level of pop culture myth, Snyder's approach all but assured that the throngs that devoured 'Sin City' would turn out in even more ferocious numbers for '300.' Enter director Zack Snyder ('Dawn of the Dead'), whose decision to marry live-action with an intensely graphic visual style was the ideal interpretation of Miller's sensibility. The original graphic novel, sprung from the mind of wunderkind Frank Miller ('Sin City,' 'The Dark Knight'), was like 'Gladiator' on steroids and seemingly tailor-made to get blown up to mega-screen proportions.
And with recent advances in CGI, there's no limit to how fantastic the images in these novels may be - in fact, if box office receipts are any indication, the more outrageous the imagery, the better.įor these reasons alone, in retrospect, it really shouldn't surprise that '300' turned into the sleeper blockbuster of 2007. With their thin text, and their bold, image-driven narrative style, even the most niche graphic novels are arguably more camera-ready than your typical best-seller. Perhaps that's why Hollywood has seen so much success with its adaptations of graphic novels in recent years. Due to inherent differences between the two mediums, inevitably major chunks of the source material get left out, to varying results. Adapting novels for the big screen has always been an imprecise art.