300 - Page 2

82ndtrooper · 03-12-2007, 16:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sdiver

Back and to the Left.....Back and to the Left.....Back and to the Left......Back and to the Left.....Back and to the Left......Back and to the Left.......Sounds like which way Congress is going now-a-days....Back and to the Left.....Back and to the Left......

Great Catch to a line that I now recall from the movie !!! I believe he was describing the "Magic Bullet" and or it's 4th shot to the front of the head.

I actually love JFK, even if it is filled with Olivers Stones personal liberties as to his own conpiracy theory. But, as he said himself, about JFK, he got 255 things right, and maybe only 5 wrong, yet in 1979 even Robert Helms(director of covert ops in 1963) himself admitted that Clay Shaw was a contract agent for the CIA

Jim Garrison was close, closer than he realized, and yet we cant even see the secret CIA documents till the year 2029. If we even get to see them then.

Max_Tab · 03-12-2007, 16:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peregrino

Just saw it. It's a "graphic novel" writ large. One dimensional and grossly distorted, with every important thought reduced to the profundity of a "soundbite". Personally, I wish they had done "Gates of Fire" and left 300 with the other adolescent fantasies in the comic books section. The history and the ideals are far too important to be trivialized for a quick profit. Sadly, I have no faith that it will inspire today's youth to anything more than another bag of popcorn. I don't think we'll have to wait long for it to be on the shelves in Walmart. Peregrino

I too wish they had done Gates of Fire, and maybe with how well this one has done they will dust it off and try and get it made. As for being on the shelves of Walmart soon I disagree, it made way to much money opening week for it to go away like a Steven Segal movie. They may have taken severe liberties with the history but the basic ideal's are still there, and in your face. This movie put's out there what the army has tried to "teach us" with it's army values system.

Hopefully this will get people interested enough to do there own research and learn the true story.

I have nothing but good things to say about this movie, as long as you take it for what it is....a rollicking good story.

NousDefionsDoc · 03-12-2007, 17:28

You can't make a movie out of Gates of Fire. It would have to be a mini-series on HBO.

blue02hd · 03-12-2007, 17:32

Really enjoyed the 300. Having become a HUGE fan of the book Gates of Fire, I am dissappointed that it couldn't lean more towards fact than fiction. Reguardless, it does well to entertain and atleast introduce the story that the book Gates explains so well. See the movie, it is well done and deserves two thumbs up. If you want more, read Gates of Fire.

GoF should be required reading in the Q Course if you ask me. Might have to add some pictures and take out some of the big words so the 18B's can keep up, but it could work.

kgoerz · 03-12-2007, 17:58

Quote:

It would have to be a mini-series on HBO.

I heard WB and the Lifetime Channel were teaming up for the GOF project

NousDefionsDoc · 03-12-2007, 19:49

Gates of Fire is fiction. Historical fiction, but fiction none the less.

**Jack Moroney (RIP)** · 03-12-2007, 19:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by NousDefionsDoc

Gates of Fire is fiction. Historical fiction, but fiction none the less.

Well now, I can remember those arrows pretty clearly even though it has been a long time, or was that Agincourt

Texian · 03-12-2007, 20:00

There was definitely a lot of dramatic license taken on the actual story, but it is, in my opinion, one hell of a film.

Texian · 03-12-2007, 20:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by NousDefionsDoc

You can't make a movie out of Gates of Fire. It would have to be a mini-series on HBO.

Now that I'd like to see.

82ndtrooper · 03-12-2007, 20:03

Gerard Butler, the lead charachter, King Leonidos, has only really one other great credit to his film acting and that was the "Phantom Of the Opera" in which he did all the singing also

The film remake of the stage play was actually pretty damn good.

He's got a career in the making with "300"

JGarcia · 03-12-2007, 21:22

I read G of F a couple of years ago. I was inspired to find out more about them, especially when people would say they were lovers of boys... So I read some of Thucydides, now this guy was an Athenian, and not a friend of Sparta, - his polis suffered mightily from Spartan wrath, - of course he was going to say they were man lovers.

I really enjoyed reading Herodotus's account of the battle as well as "The Histories."

Xenophon, on the otherhand, is also an Athenian, but a friend of the Spartans, he fought under a Spartan King. He wrote many things, and his life I think is one many modern day professional soldiers can relate to. Check him out. If you really want to know Sparta or "Lacedaemon" read Xenophon's Constitution of Lacedaemon. As I read the history of these people, I felt a familiarity with them. As if the more things change the more they stay the same.

If '300' had been more historically correct, many things would have appeared differently. For instance, Spartans wore their hair long, and in braids, falling out of their helmets. In their opinion, "it looks good, and it costs nothing." Also there were many more than 300 people defending that pass. The Ephors were not a pariah among the Spartans, they were a check and balance for the two Spartan kings. Often they were warriors too old to fight anymore, and popular among their peers, they were elected and could only serve once.

Anyhow... Lets hope 300 will generate enough interest, that perhaps a good movie can be made about all that happened at Thermopylae.

NousDefionsDoc · 03-13-2007, 12:07

Spartans by Paul Cartledge

JGarcia · 03-13-2007, 12:52

I havn't read that book yet, but VDH cites it in his books, and it is recommended reading by others as well. I'll get to this summer perhaps.

In many ways the Spartans were ahead of us, the Ephors had term limits, and only Veterans were allowed to hold office.

I read that they swore to uphold the laws that Lycurgus gave them until he returned from the Oracle, he never returned, consequently Spartans were bound to his laws, no amendments.

SouthernDZ · 03-13-2007, 13:56

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6446183.stm

Iran condemns Hollywood war epic

Historical war epic 300 has been criticised as an attack on Iranian culture by government figures.

The Hollywood film, which has broken US box office records, is an effects-laden retelling of a battle in which a small Greek army resisted a Persian invasion.
Javad Shamqadri, a cultural advisor to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said it was "plundering Iran's historic past and insulting this civilization".

He branded the film "psychological warfare" against Tehran and its people.
But Iranian culture was strong enough to withstand the assault, Mr Shamqadri said.

"American cultural officials thought they could get mental satisfaction by plundering Iran's historic past and insulting this civilization," he said.
"Following the Islamic Revolution in Iran, Hollywood and cultural authorities in the US initiated studies to figure out how to attack Iranian culture.

"Certainly, the recent movie is a product of such studies."

Daily newspaper Ayandeh-No carried the headline "Hollywood declares war on Iranians".

The paper said: "It seeks to tell people that Iran, which is in the Axis of Evil now, has for long been the source of evil and modern Iranians' ancestors are the ugly murderous dumb savages you see in 300."

Three MPs in the Iranian parliament have also written to the foreign ministry to protest against the production and screening of this "anti-Iranian Hollywood film".

The film has already proved a major box office hit in the US where it earned almost $71m (£36.8m) in its first weekend, making it the best ever March opening in North American cinemas.

This is not the first time Iran has protested over its portrayal in films made in the West.

There was outrage over the 2004 epic Alexander which showed the Macedonian general easily conquering the Persian Empire.

Monsoon65 · 03-13-2007, 15:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by SouthernDZ

He branded the film "psychological warfare" against Tehran and its people......

Hmm...kinda like the sound of that!

I just saw the movie today and thought it was great. It is a fantasy film of a historic event, but I thought it was well done and sort of reflects what's going on now, especially the theme of a hardcore army fighting with it's heart while being backdoored by the government.

Since Iran got uppity about the movie, how long until Hollyweird apologizes for it?