{"id":10683,"date":"2020-01-07T18:18:20","date_gmt":"2020-01-07T23:18:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=10683"},"modified":"2026-07-16T19:01:29","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T23:01:29","slug":"300-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=10683","title":{"rendered":"300-2007"},"content":{"rendered":"

300-2007<\/strong><\/p>\n

Director Zack Snyder<\/strong><\/p>\n

Starring Gerard Butler<\/strong><\/p>\n

Scott’s Review #977<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Reviewed January 7, 2020<\/p>\n

Grade: D<\/strong><\/p>\n

On paper, 300 (2007) could have been a good or even a great film under different circumstances, if a historical realism or a message of some kind had existed.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, what sounds like an interesting premise is met with a cartoon quality, overacting, and cheesy testosterone-laden bombast.<\/p>\n

Little more than drivel, the film is saved slightly by a charismatic lead, male flesh, and potent homo-eroticism, but this is no Magic Mike (2012), and the content fails because it is intended to be taken seriously.<\/p>\n

The result is a silly affair, with predictability and stereotypes for miles.<\/p>\n

The story is based on a 1998 comic series of the same name, a fictionalized retelling of a battle in the Persian War.<\/p>\n

The flimsy plot revolves around King Leonidas (Gerard Butler), who leads 300 Spartans into battle against the Persian “God-King” Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) and his invading army of more than 300,000 soldiers (hence the title).<\/p>\n

As the battle rages on, Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) attempts to rally support in Sparta for her husband (Leonidas) and conquer the army.<\/p>\n

Butler is the only slight positive worth mentioning as he preens and prances in little more than a loincloth with chiseled abs during the battle scenes, ferociously bellowing at his enemy.<\/p>\n

A fine-looking man, he is unarguably charismatic and poised, so the audience is strongly encouraged to root for him, and naturally for the Spartans.<\/p>\n

Leonidas makes for a powerful leader and is great to look at, but that is where any positives to this film end.<\/p>\n

The scantily clad gimmick is not intended to draw female viewers to the film, or at least the intent doesn’t seem to be there unless the marketing is botched.<\/p>\n

There is enough male nudity to go around, and the beefcake and machismo are clear in most of the characters.<\/p>\n

Laughable that the Spartans all have washboard abs and appear freshly waxed. Did they have access to state-of-the-art fitness centers in 479 BC?<\/p>\n

The Persians are mostly face-pierced and sneering, the clear enemy, which does nothing to diminish racist overtones. Spartan-good, Persian-bad.<\/p>\n

Zack Snyder’s (Dawn of the Dead, 2004) motivation seems to be to market this film to pubescent teenage males or the low-IQ crowd, so the stereotypes are not the best thing to witness, nor will they leave anyone feeling very liberated or united.<\/p>\n

The characters are either cookie-cutter or grizzled and violent, which is in tune with most of the film- bloody, but without reason, substance, or merit.<\/p>\n

One-note character after one-note character appears through each scene.<\/p>\n

Most bothersome is the intent to stir a pro-war stance, not helpful given the target audience.<\/p>\n

300 was filmed mostly using a superimposition chroma key technique to replicate the imagery of the original comic book, which only makes the film look like a high-energy video game.<\/p>\n

The product is quite stylized, with gloomy battleground scenes and a dire, bleak tone, and adopts a graphic novel or comic book approach, but lacks any subtle qualities or pretty much anything else interesting from a cinematography perspective.<\/p>\n

The battle scene finale is by the numbers and should come as no surprise who the inevitable victor is.<\/p>\n

The film requires little thought or attention span, and one can immerse oneself on a cushion and absorb the nonsense, couch-potato-style.<\/p>\n

Battle after battle erupts with cliched earnestness and a bevy of blood-spurting wounds and kills. This would be okay if there existed any point or good plot twist.<\/p>\n

Any character development is missing.<\/p>\n

300 (2007) is a weak offering and decidedly boring, a surprise since much of the action takes place on the battleground, where the pace is a mile a minute.<\/p>\n

The experience is forgettable, and a legion of other action-fueled films exist with more meat and potatoes on their plate.<\/p>\n

The sinister and stereotypical aspects make the resulting film less than fun, and the big, loud, dumb product is only marginally cinematic.<\/p>\n

We can do better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

300-2007 Director Zack Snyder Starring Gerard Butler Scott’s Review #977 Reviewed January 7, 2020 Grade: D On paper, 300 (2007) could have been a good or even a great film under different circumstances, if a historical realism or a message of some kind had existed. Unfortunately, what sounds like an interesting premise is met with … Continue reading 300-2007<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[198,11605,192,194,201,11611,286],"tags":[6176,2608,2348,4036,2606,5497,12154,12153,2605],"class_list":["post-10683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2007-movie-reviews","category-action","category-dramas","category-epics","category-fantasy-films","category-guy-films","category-historical-dramas","tag-david-wenham","tag-dominic-west","tag-gerard-butler","tag-lena-headey","tag-michael-fassbender","tag-rodrigo-santoro","tag-tom-wisdom","tag-vincent-regan","tag-zack-snyder"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10683"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10683\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23857,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10683\/revisions\/23857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}