300

“Spartans!!!, Tonight We Dine In HELL!!!”.

I think I have been waiting to see this movie since the beginning of time. 300 had a lot of hype associated with it, so I was a bit worried that it wouldn’t live up to my expectations. It did.

300 combines sort of an old-school mythical story-line with an ultramodern filming technique. Directed by Zack Snyder (who basically came out of no where), he has created a stylized world, which is in the same vein as Sky Captain, and Sin City, but very much stands on its own. Zack Snyder has shows some serious skill here. Given that the film was completely filmed on green-screen; one must realize that he must have had every shot and camera angle imagined before he began filming.

The world he created is almost dream-like, from it’s sepia coloured skies and painterly images to the extended shots of the Spartans laying waste to the Persians as the camera speeds, zooms, and shifts focus to track the battle. Some people may have a problem with a historical epic that is so stylized, but this IS based on a comic book version of that particular historical battle.

Gerard Butler who plays King Leonidas is about as much of a hardcore-man as you can possibly get. This guy would eat Maximus for breakfast – or at least steel his lunch money. His character was both driven by his ideals, but was also sensitive to his people and his family.

The plot of 300 is absolutely straightforward, and has A LOT of cool one-liners. In fact, at times, I felt like this movie was constantly trying to have cool shot after cool shot and cool line after cool line, which it probably was. But in the end, I didn’t mind, as I was totally blown away by the imagery of this film. I think that 300 takes the whole green-screen/digital filming to a whole new level. It is a logical extension from Sin City, but is an amazing example of how much control this technology can give to a gifted filmmaker.

9 out of 10.

Why not 10? CG rhino and elephants were kinda crappy.