Rock & Roll history lesson
Mar. 11th, 2007 06:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
orangerfulJust got back from seeing '300'. What a visual feast.
I was worried. You know how the trailers like to pull a bait-and-switch. Show you cool sequences, with slo-mo action, and hard rockin' tunes all edited together to make a fascination 30 second trailer, but then you see the movie and it's not at all what's on screen? SO not the case with '300'. If you saw the trailer for '300' and went "whoa, that looks cool!" then you will like the movie. Because it's a 2 hour version of the trailer.
A lot of the scenes are shot-for-shot from the graphic novel. They've added a few new bits to pad it out, expanding on Leonidas' relationship with his wife and her actions in Sparta while he was away. Which is good, because otherwise they would have run out of content pretty quick, and it also gave us a way to gage how long the battle had been going on, since they told her she would have to wait 2 days before she could speak to the council.
And why didn't anyone tell me Faramir was in it?? He was the narrator, and for once, that storytelling strategy worked! Since he is narrating it from the Spartan point of view, he makes Spartan's that much cooler and the Persians that much freakier.
The reviews are about 50/50 online. Some people seem to be taking the whole thing way too seriously. Others just dislike the look of the film, which I thought was very cool. And a few are being silly and complaining it's not "historically accurate". Well, duh. No one claimed it would be, and I think the giant mutant goat that's smoking a hookah that we see halfway thru was a BIG giveaway that some embellishments were made. (actually, don't even read those review blurbs, a lot of them make little to no sense and seem to miss the entire point of the film).
I was a bit scared of the R rating and the fact that everyone kept calling it a "guy" movie, but the violence and gore wasn't as bad as I expected. No worse than 'Sin City' - it was all very cartoony (ala Mortal Kombat). Because of the way it was all filmed, the effects blend together seamlessly, from the airbrushing of Leonidas' abs to the monsters that Xerxes sends in to attack the 300.
Also, this movie really showcases the male body and what it can be. The male body really gets little to no love in the films, usually we might just see a chest or arms here and there. But since these men are only in their little loinclothes (or loin-leathers?), we get to see a LOT of them. Their arms, legs, chest, abs - YIPES! I know they've been digitally enhanced a little bit, but some of that is them and yowza! I can't even explain it, I don't really mean it in a sexual way, just that it was beautiful and nice to see. They were realistically buff men, not some steroid creation.
Anyway! If you're in the mood for a popcorn movie that has both rock & roll, this is the one to see. It doesn't require a lot of thinking while you're watching it, though you may be tempted to pick up a history book afterward to find out the FULL story. And any movie that can make me say "Hey, I'd like to know more about that Polyponesian War!" is an amazing movie indeed.
I was worried. You know how the trailers like to pull a bait-and-switch. Show you cool sequences, with slo-mo action, and hard rockin' tunes all edited together to make a fascination 30 second trailer, but then you see the movie and it's not at all what's on screen? SO not the case with '300'. If you saw the trailer for '300' and went "whoa, that looks cool!" then you will like the movie. Because it's a 2 hour version of the trailer.
A lot of the scenes are shot-for-shot from the graphic novel. They've added a few new bits to pad it out, expanding on Leonidas' relationship with his wife and her actions in Sparta while he was away. Which is good, because otherwise they would have run out of content pretty quick, and it also gave us a way to gage how long the battle had been going on, since they told her she would have to wait 2 days before she could speak to the council.
And why didn't anyone tell me Faramir was in it?? He was the narrator, and for once, that storytelling strategy worked! Since he is narrating it from the Spartan point of view, he makes Spartan's that much cooler and the Persians that much freakier.
The reviews are about 50/50 online. Some people seem to be taking the whole thing way too seriously. Others just dislike the look of the film, which I thought was very cool. And a few are being silly and complaining it's not "historically accurate". Well, duh. No one claimed it would be, and I think the giant mutant goat that's smoking a hookah that we see halfway thru was a BIG giveaway that some embellishments were made. (actually, don't even read those review blurbs, a lot of them make little to no sense and seem to miss the entire point of the film).
I was a bit scared of the R rating and the fact that everyone kept calling it a "guy" movie, but the violence and gore wasn't as bad as I expected. No worse than 'Sin City' - it was all very cartoony (ala Mortal Kombat). Because of the way it was all filmed, the effects blend together seamlessly, from the airbrushing of Leonidas' abs to the monsters that Xerxes sends in to attack the 300.
Also, this movie really showcases the male body and what it can be. The male body really gets little to no love in the films, usually we might just see a chest or arms here and there. But since these men are only in their little loinclothes (or loin-leathers?), we get to see a LOT of them. Their arms, legs, chest, abs - YIPES! I know they've been digitally enhanced a little bit, but some of that is them and yowza! I can't even explain it, I don't really mean it in a sexual way, just that it was beautiful and nice to see. They were realistically buff men, not some steroid creation.
Anyway! If you're in the mood for a popcorn movie that has both rock & roll, this is the one to see. It doesn't require a lot of thinking while you're watching it, though you may be tempted to pick up a history book afterward to find out the FULL story. And any movie that can make me say "Hey, I'd like to know more about that Polyponesian War!" is an amazing movie indeed.
