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300: A Reader’s Horrifying First-Hand Account

March 21st, 2007 · No Comments · Culture, Film, LGBT, Politics

An update to my earlier post about 300: I noted that I haven’t seen the movie myself — and in fact would rather chew tinfoil than be subjected to it — but it turns out my friend Jason S. in San Francisco has actually undergone this harrowing ordeal and is a first-hand witness to its stupidity. He posted the following mini-review in the comments and I got his permission to front-page it:

Christ. I went and saw this movie with a lesbian and that was the gayest part of it.

Never mind the fact that the king dude makes a “boy-lovers” comment about Athens, and that the movie glossed over the fact that Spartan soldiers were encouraged to find another Spartan soldier to buddy up with in the fun way, but taking a New Criticism school of critique look at this, you’ve also got the fact that the good guys are all white, the bad guys are the Persians (you know, while we’re at war with Iraq and poised to go to war with Iran). There’s also the bit about the good guys are all beefcake and the bad guys having some unbeefy folks and transsexuals. And the queen letting herself get screwed over (literally and figuratively) because she thinks it’ll help her city-state.

I mean, there’s this point where two of the Spartans are becoming really buddy-buddy, right? Trading snarks in battle and grinning at one another and it gets to the point where I am dead sure that they’re going to kiss. And instead one of them, despite the fact that he’s been rocking the battle reflexes this whole time, stands there all stupid-like while this guy on a horse–you know, a horse, with the audible hooves and shit–comes up from a long ways off and decapitates him.

What the fuck.

This movie left a really bitter taste in my mouth, as you can tell. :p

Meanwhile, from a slightly different angle, Digby has a great post over on Hullabaloo about the movie’s not-too-subtle pro-war prop-agenda.

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