I am going to be posting this under the 300 review's section but here it is folks, the honest review from a man that loves movies:
One of the most anticipated movies of the last few years, 300 stormed theatres this past Friday, and the question everyone pondered was, did it live up to the hype? Simply put, no. 300, written by Frank Miller of Sin City fame, is a take on the Battle of Thermopylae in which the 300 Spartans fought a vastly larger army of Persians (the closest estimate today, is currently that there were 10,000 Persians) in hopes of protecting Greece. Like Sin City, Miller's rendition of the story is filled with gruesome violence, and interesting gore (although the blood is for the most part digitalized thus detracting from the intense nature of the long battles). However, unlike Sin City, 300 is not one of the best films of the year.
Perhaps the greatest compliment to give 300 is that for the first hour or so, the battles are engaging and often riveting. However, 300 drags on to the 2 hour mark, and it begins to recycle the same fighting seen in the first hour. Eventually the incessant use of slow motion becomes almost boring, and what starts out as an almost invigorating, "guy's film," becomes a clinic on how directors can manipulate the same task in multiple ways. By the time there is a battle with hardcore, guitar eccentric rock the Spartans fighting almost becomes laughable. There needed to be some grounding of the slow motion, there needed to more interesting tactics (such as pushing the Persians off the cliff) or different styles of fighting. Whenever the Spartans attack, either the neck gets slit or a leg is cut off, and by the hour-and-half mark, it just becomes tedious.
Although some of the violence drags towards the end of the film, the biggest disappointment of 300 are the actions on the periphery of the fighting. While Sin City, was beautifully written, serious but subtly ironic and hilarious, 300 has some of the worst dialogue to hit the theatres this year. If you come to 300 expecting to hear more bombastic lines such as "TONIGHT WE DINE IN HELL!" you will not find it. The majority of Leonidas' interesting speech is captured in the amazing trailer for 300. The rest of the dialogue in this movie is headache inducing. Furthering some of the poor dialogue is the loud, obnoxious, operatic music in the background which seems like it was ripped straight from Gladiator and then amplified tenfold. For a movie that has such intense, and cartoony (not to mention borderline ridiculous) gore the film is far too self-serious.
Speaking of which, one of the greatest aspects in the writing of Sin City was that it very much knew it was a graphic novel. Unlike Sin City, however 300 attempts to have more meaning, it tries to be more than a simple action movie. With more than apparent references to the Iraq war (although who the George Bush character is, is unclear) and a Jesus pose akin to Superman Returns, 300 ends up looking like another pretentious political flick (i.e. V For Vendetta). While the 300 graphic novel was written in 1999, the story was adapted for the big screen by director Zach Snyder, Kurt Johnstad, and Michael Gordon and sometimes the adapted screenplay is just too heavy-handed and self important to fit Miller's story.
Yet, even with these criticisms there are some aspects of 300 that cannot be denied. The visual appeal of the film is arguably worth the admission itself. 300 has been crowned a "movie which will revolutionize the way movies are made" as it relies so heavily on computer graphics as opposed to actors. While time will only tell how revolutionary 300 is, the movie's beauty is unparalleled.
As one of the most hyped movies of the last few years 300 is more than slightly disappointing. On its simplest level, it fails to deliver on the potential shown in the masterpiece that was its trailer. While by no means a bad movie, 300 is not much more than violence porn with a beautiful look. With weak dialogue, heavy-handed music, and a wealth of extraneous scenes 300 is about forty minutes too long and would have turned out much better if it was simply 90 minutes of straight action. 3.5/5