| 300 | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Zack Snyder |
| Produced by | Frank Miller Zack Snyder Gianni Nunnari Jeffrey Silver Mark Canton |
| Written by | Comics Frank Miller Lynn Varley Screenplay Zack Snyder Kurt Johnstad Michael Gordon |
| Starring | Gerard Butler Lena Headey Dominic West David Wenham Rodrigo Santoro |
| Music by | Tyler Bates |
| Cinematography | Larry Fong |
| Editing by | William Hoy |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. Legendary Pictures |
| Release date(s) | March 9, 2007 |
| Running time | 117 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $65 million[1] |
| Gross revenue | $456.1 million[2] |
300 is a 2007 film adaptation of the graphic novel of the same name by Frank Miller, and is a fictionalized retelling of the Battle of Thermopylae. The film is directed by Zack Snyder while Miller served as executive producer and consultant. The film was shot mostly with a super-imposition chroma key technique, to help replicate the imagery of the original comic book.
Spartan King Leonidas (Gerard Butler) and 300 Spartans fight to the last man against Persian 'God-King' Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) and his army of more than one million soldiers. As the battle rages, Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) attempts to rally support in Sparta for her husband. The story is framed by a voice-over narrative by the Spartan soldier Dilios (David Wenham). Through this narrative technique, various fantastical creatures are introduced, placing 300 within the genre of historical fantasy.
300 was released in both conventional and IMAX theaters in the United States on March 9, 2007, and on DVD, Blu-ray and HD DVD on July 31, 2007. The film broke box office records, although critics were divided over its look and style. Some acclaimed it as an original achievement, while others criticized it for favoring visuals over characterization and its controversial depiction of the ancient Persians.
Contents |
Over Dilios' narration, the life of young Leonidas is depicted. Cast into the wild to fend for his life per Spartan doctrine, Leonidas survives the harsh winter and returns home to be crowned King.
Years later, messengers arrive at the gates of Sparta demanding its submission to King Xerxes. Outraged and offended by their threats and behavior, King Leonidas and his guards kick the messengers into a pit. Acknowledging the threat of Xerxes's invasion force, he visits the Ephors proposing a strategy to repel the numerically superior enemy by using the terrain of Thermopylae (the Hot Gates), which would funnel the Persians into a narrow pass between the rocks and the sea. The Ephors, wary of Leonidas' plans, consult the Oracle, who in her trance decrees that Sparta must not go to war, lest they interrupt the sacred Carneian festival. As Leonidas departs a messenger from Xerxes appears, rewarding the Ephors a mountain of gold in return for their covert support.
Despite the Oracle's orders, Leonidas decides on a leisurely walk to the Hot Gates, gathering 300 of his best soldiers to act as his personal bodyguards. Along the way, they are joined by a force consisting of Arcadians and various other Greeks before arriving at the Hot Gates of Thermopylae. In sight of the approaching Persian army, they construct a wall to contain the Persians' advance. Leonidas meanwhile encounters Ephialtes, a hunchbacked Spartan who requests a private audience with the King. A severely disfigured child, his parents fled Sparta to spare him certain infanticide. Ephialtes asks to redeem his father's name by joining Leonidas in battle against the Persians and warns him of a secret goat path the Persians could use to outflank and surround them. Leonidas is sympathetic to the eager warrior, but rejects him upon realizing that Ephialtes cannot properly hold a shield, which would compromise the Spartans' phalanx.
Prior to the battle the Persians demand that the Spartans drop their arms and surrender. Leonidas refuses and challenges the Persians to come and take their weapons from them. With their tightly-knit phalanx formation, the Spartans funnel the Persians into the narrow terrain, repeatedly rebuffing them and inflicting heavy casualties. Xerxes, impressed with Spartan fighting skill, personally approaches Leonidas to persuade him to surrender. He promises Leonidas wealth and power in exchange for his loyalty. Leonidas declines, promising instead to make the "God King" bleed, and turns to rejoin his army. Dismayed at the refusal, Xerxes dispatches the feared Immortals (his elite personal guard), whom the Spartans draw into a trap and narrowly defeat. The battles continue, with the Spartans prevailing over soldiers and animals drawn from the vast reaches of the Persian empire: from Mongolian barbarians and Eastern chemists to African rhinoceroses and Indian war elephants. After two days of fighting however, an embittered Ephialtes defects to Xerxes and reveals the location of the goat path.
In Sparta, Queen Gorgo attempts to enlist the influential Theron to help persuade the Spartan council to send reinforcements to Leonidas. Theron agrees, but demands that Gorgo submit sexually to him, which she reluctantly consents to. At the Hot Gates, the Greeks realize Ephialtes' treachery and the Arcadians' retreat in the face of certain death. The Spartans, obedient to their law, refuse to follow, and Leonidas orders a reluctant Dilios to return and orate the story of the valiant 300 to ensure their memory. In Sparta, Queen Gorgo appeals to the council but is betrayed by Theron, who publicly accuses her of adultery in an attempt to discredit her. Enraged by his betrayal, Gorgo snatches a sword and kills Theron, rupturing a bag of Xerxes' gold in the folds of his robe and spilling it onto the ground. With this evidence, the Council denounces Theron as a traitor and unites against Persia.
At the Hot Gates, as the Persians surround the Spartans, Xerxes's general demands their surrender, declaring that Leonidas may keep his title as King of Sparta and become Warlord of all Greece, answerable only to Xerxes. Ephialtes begs him to do so as well, to which Leonidas remarks "May you live forever," an insult from a culture valuing death and valor in battle. Leonidas drops his shield and removes his helmet, seemingly bowing in submission. Stelios then leaps over him and kills the general. A furious Xerxes orders his troops to attack. As Persian archers shoot the remaining Spartans, Leonidas rises and hurls his spear at Xerxes, ripping open his cheek (and missing a fatal blow by mere centimetres), thus making "the God-King bleed." Xerxes, visibly disturbed by this reminder of his own mortality, watches as the remaining Spartans perish beneath the combined might of his army.
Concluding his tale before an audience of attentive Spartans, Dilios declares that the 120,000-strong Persian army that narrowly defeated 300 Spartans now faces 10,000 Spartans commanding 30,000 Greeks. Praising Leonidas's sacrifice, Dilios leads the assembled Greek army into a fierce charge against the Persian army, igniting the Battle of Plataea.
Producer Gianni Nunnari was not the only person planning a film about the Battle of Thermopylae; director Michael Mann already planned a film of the battle based on the book Gates of Fire. Nunnari discovered Frank Miller's graphic novel 300, which impressed him enough to acquire the film rights.[3][4] 300 was jointly produced by Nunnari and Mark Canton, and Michael B. Gordon wrote the script.[5] Director Zack Snyder was hired in June 2004[6] as he had attempted to make a film on Miller's novel before making his debut with the remake of Dawn of the Dead,[7] Snyder then had screenwriter Kurt Johnstad rewrite Gordon's script for production[6] and Frank Miller was retained as consultant and executive producer.[8]
The film is a shot-for-shot adaptation of the comic book, similar to the film adaptation of Sin City.[9] Snyder photocopied panels from the comic book, from which he planned the preceding and succeeding shots. "It was a fun process for me... to have a frame as a goal to get to," he said.[10] Like the comic book, the adaptation also used the character Dilios as a narrator. Snyder used this narrative technique to show the audience that the surreal "Frank Miller world" of 300 was related from a subjective perspective. By utilizing Dilios' gift of storytelling, he is able to introduce fantasy elements into the film, explaining that "Dilios is a guy who knows how not to wreck a good story with truth."[11] Snyder also added the sub-plot in which Queen Gorgo attempts to rally support for her husband.[12]
Two months of pre-production were required to create hundreds of shields, spears and swords, some of which were recycled from Troy and Alexander. An animatronic wolf and thirteen animatronic horses were also created. The actors trained alongside the stuntmen, and even Snyder joined in. Upwards of 600 costumes were created for the film, as well as extensive prosthetics for various characters and the corpses of Persian soldiers.[13]
300 entered active production on October 17, 2005 in Montreal,[14] and was shot over the course of sixty days[13] in chronological order[12] with a budget of $60 million.[15] Employing the digital backlot technique, Snyder shot at the now-defunct Icestorm Studios in Montreal using bluescreens. Butler said that while he didn't feel constrained by Snyder's direction, fidelity to the comic imposed certain limitations on his performance. Wenham said there were times when Snyder wanted to precisely capture iconic moments from the comic book, and other times when he gave actors freedom "to explore within the world and the confines that had been set".[16] Headey said of her experience with the bluescreens, "It's very odd, and emotionally, there's nothing to connect to apart from another actor."[17] Only one scene, in which horses travel across the countryside, was shot outdoors.[18] The film was an intensely physical production, and Butler pulled an arm tendon and developed a foot drop.[19]
Post-production was handled by Montreal's Meteor Studios and Hybride Technologies filled in the bluescreen footage with more than 1500 visual effects shots. Visual effects supervisor Chris Watts and production designer Jim Bissell created a process dubbed "The Crush,"[13] which allowed the Meteor artists to manipulate the colors by increasing the contrast of light and dark. Certain sequences were desaturated and tinted to establish different moods. Ghislain St-Pierre, who led the team of artists, described the effect: "Everything looks realistic, but it has a kind of a gritty illustrative feel."[13][20] Various computer programs, including Maya, RenderMan and RealFlow, were used to create the "spraying blood."[21] The post-production lasted for a year and was handled by a total of ten special effects companies.[22]
In July 2005, composer Tyler Bates had begun work on the film, describing the score as having "beautiful themes on the top and large choir," but "tempered with some extreme heaviness." The composer had scored for a test scene that the director wanted to show to Warner Bros. to illustrate the path of the project. Bates said that the score had "a lot of weight and intensity in the low end of the percussion" that Snyder found agreeable to the film.[23] The score was recorded at Abbey Road Studios and features the vocals of Azam Ali.[24] A standard edition and a special edition of the soundtrack containing 25 tracks was released on March 6, 2007, with the special edition containing a 16-page booklet and three two-sided trading cards.[25]
The score has given rise to some controversy in the film composer community, garnering criticism for its striking similarity to several other recent soundtracks, including James Horner and Gabriel Yared's work for the film Troy. The heaviest borrowings are said to be from Elliot Goldenthal's 1999 score for Titus. "Remember Us," from 300, is identical in parts to the "Finale" from Titus, and "Returns a King" is similar to the cue "Victorius Titus."[26][27][28] (see Copyright issues) However, on August 3, 2007, Warner Bros. Pictures acknowledged in an official statement, "a number of the music cues for the score of 300 were, without our knowledge or participation, derived from music composed by Academy Award winning composer Elliot Goldenthal for the motion picture Titus. Warner Bros. Pictures has great respect for Elliot, our longtime collaborator, and is pleased to have amicably resolved this matter."[29]
The official 300 website was launched by Warner Bros. in December 2005. The "conceptual art" and Zack Snyder's production blog were the initial attractions of the site.[30] Later, the website added video journals describing production details, including comic-to-screen shots and the creatures of 300. In January 2007, the studio launched a MySpace page for the film.[31] The Art Institutes created a micro-site to promote the film.[32]
At Comic-Con International in July 2006, the 300 panel aired a promotional teaser of the film, which was positively received[33] but despite stringent security, the trailer was then leaked on the Internet.[34] Warner Bros. released the official trailer for 300 on October 4, 2006[35] and later on it made its debut on Apple.com where it received considerable exposure. The background music used in the trailers was "Just Like You Imagined" by Nine Inch Nails. A second 300 trailer, which was attached to Apocalypto, was released in theaters on December 8, 2006,[36] and online the day before.[37] On January 22, 2007 an exclusive trailer for the film was broadcast during prime time television.[38] The trailers have been credited with igniting interest in the film and contributing to its box-office success.[39]
In April 2006, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment announced its intention to make a PlayStation Portable game, 300: March to Glory, based on the film. Collision Studios worked with Warner Bros. to capture the style of the film in the video game, which was released simultaneously with the film in the United States.[40] The National Entertainment Collectibles Association produced a series of action figures based on the film,[41] as well as replicas of weapons and armor.[42]
Warner Bros. promoted 300 by sponsoring the Ultimate Fighting Championship's light heavyweight champion Chuck Liddell, who made personal appearances and participated in other promotional activities.[43] The studio also joined with the National Hockey League to produce a 30-second TV spot promoting the film in tandem with the Stanley Cup playoffs.[44]
In August 2006, Warner Bros. announced 300's release as March 16, 2007,[45] but in October the release was moved forward to March 9, 2007.[35] 300 was released on DVD, HD DVD and BD on July 31, 2007 in Region 1 territories, in single-disc and two-disc editions. 300 was released in single-disc and steelcase two-disc editions on DVD, HD DVD and BD on August 2007 in Region 2 territories, albeit not in every Region 2 country such as the United Kingdom and Germany.
On July 9, 2007, the American cable channel TNT bought the rights to broadcast the film from Warner Bros.[46] TNT will be able to start airing the movie in September of 2009. Sources say that the network paid between $17 million[47] and just under $20 million[46] for the movie. TNT agreed to a three-year deal instead of the more typical five-year deal.[47]
300 was released in North America on March 9, 2007, in both conventional and IMAX theaters.[48] It grossed $28,106,731 on its opening day and ended its North American opening weekend with $70,885,301, breaking the record held by Ice Age: The Meltdown for the biggest opening weekend in the month of March.[49] 300's opening weekend gross is the 24th highest in box office history, coming slightly below The Lost World: Jurassic Park but higher than Transformers.[50] It was the third biggest opening for an R-rated film ever, behind The Matrix Reloaded ($91.8 million) and The Passion of the Christ ($83.8 million).[51] The film also set a record for IMAX cinemas with a $3.6 million opening weekend,[52] which was later broken by The Dark Knight.
300 opened two days earlier, on March 7, 2007, in Sparta, and across Greece on March 8.[53][54] Studio executives were surprised by the showing, which was twice what they had expected.[55] They credit the movie's stylized violence, the strong female role of Queen Gorgo which attracted a large number of women to the movie, and the MySpace advertising blitz.[56] Producer Mark Canton said, "MySpace had an enormous impact but it has transcended the limitations of the Internet or the graphic novel. Once you make a great movie, word can spread very quickly."[56]
Since its world premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival on February 14, 2007, in front of 1,700 audience members, 300 has received generally mixed reviews. While it received a standing ovation at the public premiere,[57] it was reportedly panned at a press screening hours earlier, where many attendees left during the showing and those who remained booed at the end.[58] In North America, critical reviews of 300 are divided. On the Rotten Tomatoes website, it currently garners a 60% approval rating from listed critics and 47% from its "Cream of the Crop."[59] On the Metacritic website, the film received a rating of 51/100 based on 34 reviews, resulting in "Mixed or Average Reviews" status.[60]
The major industry trade newspaper Variety's Todd McCarthy describes the film as "visually arresting" although "bombastic"[61] while Kirk Honeycutt, writing in The Hollywood Reporter, praises the "beauty of its topography, colors and forms."[62] Writing in the Chicago Sun Times, Richard Roeper acclaims 300 as "the Citizen Kane of cinematic graphic novels."[63] 300 was also warmly received by websites focusing on comics and video games. Comic Book Resources' Mark Cronan found the film compelling, leaving him "with a feeling of power, from having been witness to something grand."[64] IGN's Todd Gilchrist acclaimed Zack Snyder as a cinematic visionary and the "possible redeemer of modern moviemaking."[65]
A number of critical reviews appeared in major American newspapers. A.O. Scott of the New York Times describes 300 as "about as violent as Apocalypto and twice as stupid," as well as criticizing its color scheme and suggesting that its plot includes racist undertones.[66] Kenneth Turan writes in the Los Angeles Times that "unless you love violence as much as a Spartan, Quentin Tarantino or a video-game-playing teenage boy, you will not be endlessly fascinated."[67] Roger Ebert, in his review, gave the film a two-star rating writing, "300 has one-dimensional caricatures who talk like professional wrestlers plugging their next feud."[68]
Some Greek newspapers have been particularly critical, such as film critic Robby Eksiel saying that moviegoers would be dazzled by the "digital action" but irritated by the "pompous interpretations and one-dimensional characters."[69][54]
At the MTV Movie Awards 2007, 300 was nominated for Best Movie, Best Performance for Gerard Butler, Best Breakthrough Performance for Lena Headey, Best Villain for Rodrigo Santoro, and Best Fight for Leonidas battling "the Uber Immortal".[70] It eventually won the award for Best Fight. 300 won both the Best Dramatic Film and Best Action Film honors in the 2006-2007 Golden Icon Awards presented by Travolta Family Entertainment.[71] In December 2007, 300 won IGN's Movie of the Year 2007,[72] along with Best Comic Book Adaptation[73] and King Leonidas as Favorite Character.[74] At the 2008 Saturn Awards, the movie won the award for Best Action/Adventure/Thriller Film.[75]
300's director Zack Snyder stated in an MTV interview that "The events are 90 percent accurate. It's just in the visualization that it's crazy.... I've shown this movie to world-class historians who have said it's amazing. They can't believe it's as accurate as it is." He continues that the film is "an opera, not a documentary. That's what I say when people say it's historically inaccurate".[76] However he is quoted in a BBC News story that the film is, at its core "a fantasy film." He also describes the film's narrator, Dilios, as "a guy who knows how not to wreck a good story with truth."[11]
Paul Cartledge, Professor of Greek History at Cambridge University, advised the filmmakers on the pronunciation of Greek names, and states that they "made good use" of his published work on Sparta. He praises the film for its portrayal of "the Spartans' heroic code," and of "the key role played by women in backing up, indeed reinforcing, the male martial code of heroic honor," while expressing reservations about its "'West' (goodies) vs 'East' (baddies) polarization."[77] Cartledge writes that he enjoyed the film, although he found Leonidas' description of the Athenians as "boy lovers" ironic, given his views on the institutional pederasty of the Spartan educational system.[78]
Ephraim Lytle, assistant professor of Hellenistic History at the University of Toronto, states that 300 selectively idealizes Spartan society in a "problematic and disturbing" fashion, as well as portraying the "hundred nations of the Persians" as monsters and non-Spartan Greeks as weak. He suggests that the film's moral universe would have seemed as "bizarre to ancient Greeks as it does to modern historians."[79]
Victor Davis Hanson, formerly professor of Classical history at California State University, Fresno, who wrote the foreword to a 2007 re-issue of the graphic novel, states that the film demonstrates a specific affinity with the original material of Herodotus in that it captures the martial ethos of ancient Sparta and represents Thermopylae as a "clash of civilizations". He remarks that Simonides, Aeschylus and Herodotus viewed Thermopylae as a battle against "Eastern centralism and collective serfdom", which opposed "the idea of the free citizen of an autonomous polis".[80] He further states that the film portrays the battle in a "surreal" manner, and that the intent was to "entertain and shock first, and instruct second."[81]
Touraj Daryaee, associate professor of Ancient History at California State University, Fullerton, criticizes the movie's use of classical sources, writing:
Some passages from the Classical authors Aeschylus, Diodorus, Herodotus and Plutarch are spilt over the movie to give it an authentic flavor. Aeschylus becomes a major source when the battle with the “monstrous human herd” of the Persians is narrated in the film. Diodorus’ statement about Greek valor to preserve their liberty is inserted in the film, but his mention of Persian valor is omitted. Herodotus’ fanciful numbers are used to populate the Persian army, and Plutarch’s discussion of Greek women, specifically Spartan women, is inserted wrongly in the dialogue between the “misogynist” Persian ambassador and the Spartan king. Classical sources are certainly used, but exactly in all the wrong places, or quite naively.[82]
Before the release of 300, Warner Brothers expressed concerns about the political aspects of the film's theme. Snyder relates that "There was a huge sensitivity about East versus West with the studio."[83] Media speculation about a possible parallel between the Greco-Persian conflict and current events began in an interview with Snyder that was conducted before the Berlin Film Festival.[84] The interviewer remarked that "everyone is sure to be translating this [film] into contemporary politics." Snyder replied that, while he was aware that people would read the film through the lens of contemporary events, no parallels between the film and the contemporary world were intended.[85]
Outside the current political parallels, some critics have raised more general questions about the film's ideological orientation. The New York Post's Kyle Smith writes that the film would have pleased "Adolf's boys",[86] and Slate's Dana Stevens compares the film to The Eternal Jew, "as a textbook example of how race-baiting fantasy and nationalist myth can serve as an incitement to total war".[87] Roger Moore, a critic for the Orlando Sentinel, relates 300 to Susan Sontag's definition of "fascist art".[88]
However, Newsday critic Gene Seymour stated that such reactions are misguided, writing that "the movie's just too darned silly to withstand any ideological theorizing."[89] Snyder himself dismissed ideological readings, suggesting that reviewers who critique a "graphic novel movie about a bunch of guys...stomping the snot out of each other" using words like " 'neocon,' 'homophobic,' 'homoerotic' or 'racist' " are "missing the point."[90]
Since its opening, 300 also attracted controversy over its portrayal of Persians. Various critics, historians, journalists, and officials of the Iranian government including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad[91] denounced the film.[92][93][94] As in the graphic novel, the Persians were depicted as a monstrous, barbaric and demonic horde, and King Xerxes was portrayed as androgynous.[95][96] Critics suggested that this was meant to stand in stark contrast to the masculinity of the Spartan army.[97] Steven Rea argued that the film's Persians were a vehicle for an anachronistic cross-section of Western stereotypes of Asian and African cultures.[98]
The film's portrayal of ancient Persians caused a particularly strong reaction in Iran.[99] Azadeh Moaveni of Time reported that Tehran was "outraged" following the film's release. Moaveni identified two factors which may have contributed to the intense reaction: its release on the eve of Nowruz, the Persian New Year, and the common Iranian view of the Achaemenid Empire as "a particularly noble page in their history."[100][101][102] Various Iranian officials condemned the film.[103][104][105][106] The Iranian Academy of the Arts submitted a formal complaint against the movie to UNESCO, labelling it an attack on the historical identity of Iran.[107][108] The Iranian mission to the U.N. protested the film in a press release,[109] and Iranian embassies protested its screening in France,[110] Thailand,[111] Turkey,[112] and Uzbekistan.[113]
Slovenian philosopher and author Slavoj Žižek defended the movie from those who attacked it as an example of "the worst kind of patriotic militarism with clear allusions to recent tensions with Iran and Iraq." He wrote that the story represents a "poor, small country (Greece) invaded by the army of a much larger state (Persia)," suggesting that the identification of the Spartans with a modern superpower is flawed. Instead of seeing a "fundamentalist" aspect in the Spartan identity, he stated that "all modern egalitarian radicals, from Rousseau to the Jacobins…imagined the republican France as a new Sparta".[114]
In response to the criticisms, a Warner Bros. spokesman stated that the film 300 "is a work of fiction inspired by the Frank Miller graphic novel and loosely based on a historical event. The studio developed this film purely as a fictional work with the sole purpose of entertaining audiences; it is not meant to disparage an ethnicity or culture or make any sort of political statement."[99]
300 has been spoofed in various media, spawning the "This is Sparta!" internet meme,[115] with parodies also appearing in film and television. These include the short United 300, which won the Movie Spoof Award at the 2007 MTV Movie Awards. Skits based upon the film have appeared on Saturday Night Live[116] and Robot Chicken, the latter of which mimicked the visual style of 300 in a parody set during the American Revolutionary War, titled "1776".[117][118]
20th Century Fox released Meet the Spartans, a spoof of 300. Universal Pictures is planning a similar parody, titled National Lampoon's 301: The Legend of Awesomest Maximus Wallace Leonidas.[119]
300 was also parodied in an episode of South Park named "D-Yikes!".[120]
In June 2008, producers Mark Canton, Gianni Nunnari and Bernie Goldmann revealed that work had begun on a sequel/prequel to 300.[121] Legendary Pictures has announced that Frank Miller is writing the follow-up graphic novel, and Zack Snyder has declared his interest in directing the adaptation. Snyder is waiting until he sees the graphic novel before officially signing on to the project.[122]
| Preceded by Wild Hogs |
Box office number-one films of 2007 (USA) March 11, 2007 – March 18, 2007 |
Succeeded by TMNT |
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