300 (2007)

Overall Rating From 1 to 100: 68

Directed by Zack Snyder
Gerard Butler / Lena Headey / Rodrigo Santoro
117 min. Action / War
MPAA: R (for graphic battle sequences throughout, some sexuality and nudity)

Review by Jason Pyles / March 20, 2007

My film history class thinks "300" is nothing less than phenomenal. The voters on the Internet Movie Database currently have "300" ranked 202 out of the top 250 movies. Maybe 10,000 movie fans can't be wrong, but something about these 300 Spartans is amiss.

That something is this: The movie doesn't ever go anywhere … literally. The battles take place in one spot. Moreover, the same fatal blows and administration of death occur over and over again. Really, it's monotonous. (Yes, we're all familiar with CGI, and we're all impressed.)

Moreover, the movie reduces to the baseness of a Balinese cockfight (although Clifford Geertz would have probably fought to the death over such an assertion).

It's this simple: Remember "Fight Club" (1999)? Well, "300" is basically "Fight Club," but it's set back in 480 B.C. The story isn’t the same, of course, but both movies are as macho as Randy Savage snappin’ into a Slim Jim. “Oh, yeah.” (Incidentally, it should be known: I believe Savage stole that catchphrase from Kool-aid man.)

“Three-hundred” is adapted from Frank Miller's graphic novel (don’t even say “a glorified comic book”), which illustrates the battle at Thermopylae where 300 Spartans warred against a numerous host of Persian assailants.

King Leonidas of Sparta (Gerard Butler) receives a threatening request from King Xerxes of Persia (Rodrigo Santoro). (King Xerxes, by the way, might remind you of an upsetting blend between Mr. T and Rhu Paul.)

After kicking Xerxes’ messenger into “the hole” that Glen Phillips sings about on “Unlucky 7,” Leonidas consults some yucky monks on a mountain top, who then consult a scandalous oracle, who then indicates that Sparta should not go to war.

Without having the oracle’s blessing for war, and therefore, the support of Sparta’s political powers that be, the king takes 300 of his best men to “guard” him at this strategically special spot near the sea. From this point on, the Persians bring bigger and better onslaughts of fighting freaks and battling beasts to challenge the mighty 300.

“Three-hundred” isn’t a man’s movie as much as it is a 14-year-old’s movie. It has plenty of violence, action, blood, gore, nudity, sexual situations and some misplaced electric guitars on the soundtrack. What more could a pre-pubescent voyeur wish to view?

Just as a lot of people like "Fight Club," many like "300," too. The former is superior to the latter, however. Both movies have strong beginnings and lose stamina as they progress.

Though “300” has some entertaining scenes, which I could surely appreciate, I cannot whole-heartedly recommend it because the nudity and sexuality were exploitative and unnecessary. (But when are such things necessary?)

A movie with this much testosterone could pull a pre-pubescent teen through puberty in about 117 minutes … If only "300" were released back when I was in Mr. Homer's fifth-grade swimming class: Then that wooly mammoth, Cro-Magnon kid named Bruce wouldn't have made me feel so self-conscious in the locker room.

O Masterpiece (95-100)
O Excellent (75-94)
X Good video rental (60-74)
O Merely OK (50-59)
O Pure mediocrity (30-49)
O Medusa: don't watch (1-29)

Copyright 2007.
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