Friday, March 9, 2007

300

Ben, you said you enjoyed "300"?

Boston.com had a well-written review of the m0vie. The review was fun to read, but the reviewer said the movie was crap inbetween action sequences, which are the only good part.

Here is one of the best lines from the write-up, followed by a few lines that confused me. Does it mean "300" was homoerotic the way Troy was?

It's a testament to the inherent cinematic depth of Miller's graphic novels that the movies based on them are so vicariously dull. "Sin City" was like watching your buddy get a lap dance. "300" is often like watching that buddy play a video game.

"300" is about a bunch of hot white metrosexuals -- those pecs, those abs, that hair -- against a million freaky nonwhite club kids. In other words, the gays. King Xerxes's hangout is full hookah-puffers, derelicts, and girls making it with girls (let's call them lesbians). According to this outrageously flagrant movie, the Spartans didn't just die for Glory, Duty, and Destiny. They died to keep the Hot Gates from turning into another gay disco.

Mike is dragging me to see it tonight. I'll let you know what I think.

1 comment:

Ben Monopoli said...

The reviewer is wrong about the Spartans being metrosexuals. They were quite the opposite, in my opinion. They were all grizzly old men in their 40s or 50s, with bodies so classically "adult male" and so different from the pretty-boy image we're always being sold, that they weren't even attractive to me. They were tanks, but I appreciated that, compared to the unbelievably lithe and elfin Brad Pitt and Orlando Bloom.

But unfortunately, the reviewer is semi-correct about the other side, the bad guys. Xerxes, the main bad guy, especially -- he looks so much like a drag queen that it made me uncomfortable. Not uncomfortable within the movie, because the Spartans never commented on it, but it made me wonder just what the filmmakers were trying to insinuate by having the thunderous macho men go up against the flamer.