FILM REVIEW - 300

I went to see the film ‘300’ with my friend Andy, who has recently moved to Cambridge from Bristol. After reading a few reviews, and seeing the trailer, I was eagerly expecting it to be camp, which it was, in all its full gory glory. It was also quite a good heroic romp, with a well-written script and, how can I put this, the best in over the top costume design. Spartans dressed in leather underpants, huge red cloaks resting on broad well oiled shoulders, each with a six pack to die for. I’m sure Xerxes was never, in reality, quite so heavily made up with fake tan and eye liner,or bedecked in so much ‘bling’ that he looked like a deranged curtain rail. But then historical fact and this film parted company a long long time ago. And,yes, its true, some of the Spartans were played by actors hand picked from the- In Your Face Brian Blessed School of Acting, but that did actually suit the style of the movie. Having seen ‘Sin City’ made by the same team, I’d also expected the film to be nauseatingly gory and without any moral compass. The film was, however, so stylised you hardly felt the pain as a spear made a awfully big tear in the pneumatic torso of yet another Spartan, or one more leg was casually lopped off a Persian minion in mid air.

Andy, quite rightly pointed out the moral hypocrisy of the Spartan’s position, supposedly fighting for a decent clean living, slave free, republican democracy. Lets just say they bypassed the United Nations and went to indiscriminate slaughter without saying please. It did not go unnoticed that this film did appear to become a historical justification for the current actions of the US and its cohorts in Iraq. One more manufactured international incident and they’ll actually be in Persia by Christmas.