CNS Movie Review: 300

300

By Harry Forbes
Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) -- Fans of the 1962 film "The 300 Spartans" are in for a vastly different experience with "300" (Warner Bros.).

This is a noisy, testosterone-charged retelling of the legendary Battle of Thermopylae (482 B.C.), gussied up with graphic novel trappings, as ancient Sparta's meager 300 soldiers led by King Leonidas (Gerard Butler) fearlessly go up against the vast Persian army headed by the formidable Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro). They would ultimately fail, but their bravery would inspire other Greeks to withstand the Persian incursions on their land.

During a tense meeting between the two leaders, Xerxes -- rather like Satan tempting Christ -- offers Leonidas riches, security and more, if only the latter will kneel before him. Needless to say, Leonidas demurs.

Back home, Sparta's Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) futilely attempts to sway a corrupt politician, Theron (Dominic West), with influence in the Spartan Council to bolster her husband's troops, even allowing him sexual favors.

Needless to say, the Spartans go out fighting to the last, and the film relishes every fatal blow and well-aimed spear.

With the graphic novel of Frank Miller ("Sin City") as a springboard, director and co-writer Zack Snyder takes a highly stylized approach. Snyder's dialogue -- written in tandem with Kurt Johnstad and Michael B. Gordon -- is undemandingly simplistic, with the focus, naturally, squarely on the action sequences.

Performances are fine, given the limited opportunity for nuance. Butler -- who, you may recall, played "The Phantom of the Opera" -- generates the requisite gravitas as the powerful leader, and his Scottish burr is not too distracting. Headey has a few good moments, but powerful as Spartan women are said to have been, it's the men who dominate here.

Most of the film is shot in sepia tones, striking at first, but soon becoming tiresome. Leonidas and his impossibly buffed soldiers facing off against digitalized weapons, strange creatures, and seemingly thousands of enemy troops, though the pervasive battlefield violence is somewhat tempered by the often genuinely artful cinematography.

The film also can be experienced in the giant Imax format.

The film contains much slow-motion fighting with bloodshed, impalings, and decapitations, an adulterous episode with an implied rough sexual encounter, brief upper female and rear nudity, innuendo, some exotic dancing with a lesbian kiss during a brief orgy sequence, and skimpy male attire throughout. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L -- limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R -- restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

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Forbes is director of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. More reviews are available online at www.usccb.org/movies.

END

Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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