nothing more than i can do concerning your piece criticizing the movie "300" expressing my congratulations and appreciations.

as i usually said before, the surface is usually very different from the reality and your sameless background and view towards historical events once more enable intellectuals to reconsider history thoroughly.

This movie is an example of "psychological warfare" against Iran by Wasp/profit driven Hollywood. You go to movie and watch Demons vs. Spartans. Since historical facts has no base, other than Miller’s technique and art of visual, this movie is about half naked guys full of muscle which reminded me the brokeback mountain.

Wait until this move to gets to the blockbuster if you care about your 2 cents. If you want to see so-called the democratic, hero, rational West vs evil and barbaric East, than ship ahoy…
I would really like to see a budget movie about Fatih Sultan Mehmet conquering Istanbul. It would make a great movie with “Since 1453” title…

Hello, I've read your review about the movie 300 and I'd like to comment on that, if I may.

On the realism factor of this movie I'd like to point out that this movie is an adaptation of a so called 'graphic novel' i.e. comic book and not a correct historical depiction of those events. Therefor this movie is mainly about the cinematography and the great shots adapted to screen. Also the entire movie you're watching the tale of a storyteller that is trying to convince the Spartan senate to support Leonidas and go to war against the invading forces upon them. Because of this the story and the unreal elements in it might be a (little) bit exaggerated.

The rant about 300's 'orientalism' is (in my humble opinion) totally wrong. This movie has a simple goal; to entertain. It's a simple plot, with a simple way of showing it. Every movie has it's bad guy, in this movie it's the invading forces of king Xerxes, nothing more, nothing less. A simple device to get the audience to get on the good guys' side is to depict the bad guys as evil, ugly, disfigured and unappealing as possible.

Every race has had their antagonist. The Chinese faced the mighty hordes of the Mongolians. The Trojans faced the bloodthirsty Greeks. The Scotish were supressed by the ugly English. Etc. etc. In every movie the antoganist is made to look as wrong and evil as possible, just like in this movie. So if you somehow take offence in the fact that the bad guy in this movie was the Persian empire, blame history, not the creators of this movie.

Anyway, it's just a movie, take it easy dude.

Greetings from The Netherlands,

Guus

As a Greek, I was not satisfied by the particular movie -the historical inaccuracies were too many and the distinction between the "evil" Persians and "good" Greeks was at least ridiculous.
As a viewer though, I can tell that the figurative/artistic result was satisfactory.

Moreover, let's not search for historical correlations in movies made by the Americans... either someone enjoys the movie or not, still the fact remains the same:
History cannot be changed, but we can all work together for a better future.

I would also like to offer a few comments on your review of the movie "300." You are right to understand that ancient Sparta was not a beacon of liberty, rather a citadel of fascism. Sparta was strongly opposed to Athenian democracy. You are right to understand that ancient Sparta was devoted to militarism, and right to understand ancient Sparta to be the first to practice a form of eugenics.

However, there are several points in your review with which I would take issue. In order of your review, I would say first, the references to "freedom" and "reason" are juxtaposed against any religious belief (the "grotesquely deformed" Ephors are presented as a straw man argument against the Spartan's own religious views in favor of, I suppose, atheistic freedom). And, so it is in this sense an anti-theistic movie in general, not simply an anti-oriental movie.

Second, I doubt that the overall pitch of the movie was to present a "West defending itself against the East" argument. The "clash of civilizations" argument is an overstatement.

Third, you are correct to say that "the film is full of unrealistic images," and that is precisely the point. The movie is, after all, based on a comic book version of events and represent more art than real life.

And last, while it is true that Spartans did often (but not always) involve their young boys in homosexual relationships, it is a stretch beyond reason to conclude that the Spartan army was composed of "mostly gays who were trying to show off to each other with their military skills." Historically, individual military prowess was frowned upon as the Spartans did not fight as individuals, but in units (the phalanx). Individual prowess would have been as deadly for the other Spartans as for their adversaries. Sparta was not strictly "a land of homosexual pedophilia." Spartan men were commanded to marry and have children. And so, I think it is a straw man argument to simply name them a bunch of homosexual warriors. They were neither homosexual nor warriors. They were Spartans (mostly heterosexual, stripped of every thought of ego by means of homosexual rape) and soldiers (fighting as units, not warriors fighting as individuals). For all of their faults as a society, let us not impose modern judgments on an ancient culture.

The King of the Spartans among the most notorious in homosexual and child lovers in ancient history... Xerxes, the Persian Emperor, is so gay, doomed with all those eye rings, eye liner, leather top and bottoms; yet he fills his tent with lesbians? The King of the Spartans telling his herds of La Fitness buddies as “the world’s one hope for reason and justice.” That would be the same Sparta that owned slaves and made running off into the woods and murdering a slave a right of passage for young boys.
And the long sex scene between the Spartan King and his wife added just pornographic material to the whole scheme but I can’t call this as a masterpiece.

It’s also very odd Homophobe friendly depiction of the Spartans, who in reality were arguably the gayest culture in human History- homosexual pedophilia, was compulsory, in the movie contrarily they’re all good hetero guys and only the evil Persians are gay.

Indeed, from the point of movie technique; If Miller wanted come up with a “LOTR” type wanabee master piece using his Sin City/Dare Devil Cinematographic skills; he would pick a marvel like a character to justify his intention. Instead he did pick an important historical reference point, where he didn’t have any Historic or scientific background, as a movie to incubate his real objective-to insult Eastern civilization.

The striking point in the movie is that there are a lot of similarities between US invading Iraq and convincing the his citizens with well crafted reasoning such as; Spartan Queen demanding the council to bring up more soldiers to frontiers to support 300… Didn’t that make you think W. Bush asking new House of Representatives (Full of Democrats now) for more troops to Iraq?

There is an ancient saying “Eyes see what they want to see”…and unless you Westerners don’t put yourself in the shoes of those innocent people, you will look out to find new weapons to kill more instead of piece and justice.

As a Turk, if asked to choose between the Greek and the Persian civilisation i would choose the Greek.

Though Sparta was not `democratic' in the modern sense, it certainly was not the `oriental' despotism that characterized Persia in the ancient world (there I go with my `orientalism' again!)

The fact is, if the Persians had prevailed at thermopylae (or Marathon) ancient democracy in Attica would have been crushed...

thanks
Roundhead

The inherently pederastic nature of the Greek culture (which at the time was the dominant culture of the eastern mediteranean) was repulsive to the Jews. Which is why Judea revolted against the Seleukan Greeks (based in Antioch, now part of Turkey) untill the demise of the Greek rule in Judea. Thus the legend of the Male-dominated heavily muscled Spartan spirit was decimated. As for elephants, Indian elephants were used against the Jews, and in a specific incident on of Juda the Maccabee's brothers was crushed under an elephant he struck to the belly.
fast-forward to todays politics. The Islamo-fascist crowd would portray the Jewish re-birth in Judea as an imperialistic invasion of the West. complete with blond blue eyed aryans. Nothing is further from the truth. The majority of the Jews are the progeny of the down-trodden Jews of north-Africa, Egypt iraq syria and Yemen Kurdistan and Gruzia. Also the progeny of those pityful few not eradicated by the efforts of Nazi and Islamo-fascism. Nothing Aryan or heavily muscled about the vast majority. But for the Islamo-fscist white-power-erstwhile communist coalition any Jew who will weild a weapon to avoid his his parents fate is an imperialist, for the only good Jew is a dead Jew.

Although I am tired of everyone being offended by everything, I can appreciate the offense taken by the iranians over this movie. The truth is that we in the west use a double standard. Let's say the movie (released and heavily promoted to the american audience) depicted rat-faced Jewish Israeli's attacking handsome, smart, and compassionate muslims in lebanon who were desperately holding onto what was left of their land. I can assure you that the Jewish community would've been in a uproar. They have been upset by far less things this year. They would've boycotted the movie and pressured to keep it from being released!! At which time the producers would say, "It's only a fictional movie", "It's entertainment". It is one thing to depict the battle of thermopylae as the greeks tell the story (300 against a million) and make it a spectacular visual presentation, it is a different story to depict the peoples (for whom we are currently in conflict with) as evil monkey-faced monsters who want to destroy freedom-loving americans...I mean Spartans. I definitely do not subscribe to the notion that democracy would've been wiped out by the persians. If you study history (actually the History channel just had a great program on the Persians "engineering an empire"), the Persians are credited as being the first tolerant multiethnic empire. The Persians were not known to have had slaves (the evidence is strong that everyone including women were paid!). They also did not interfere with the lifestle, culture, or religion of their citizens. Cyrus the great actually freed the Jews from captivity, sent them back to Jerusalem, and paid for the rebuilding of their temple. This policy was held until the time of Darius III. Secondly, democracy was crushed by the despotic macedonians. Folks, Alexander and Phillip were megolamaniac kings who conquered Greece and slaughtered the democrats of Athens. Then the Romans conquered the Greeks. Then the Ottomans, etc...Despite this, the idea of democracy remained. It was after all an idea, and ideas can survive and be used another day. FYI After Alexander conquered Persia, his generals squabbled over the land, divided it up and choked on the wealth. It was considered a time of oppression for many ethnic groups including the Jews. The Jews lived so well under the persians that they wrote the Torah down at that time (i.e. times were stable and safe) and even had power for the first time in a millenium (Israel was under Persian control at that time, but the Persians allowed the Jews to rule themselves; the governor was Israeli). In summary, although I can appreciate not taking a movie too seriously, if the movie was about mexicans and it depicted the mexicans in monkey outfits, you better believe the movie would've been pulled. And the movie really is about east and west. In fact that very battle of thermopylae is consider one of the single most important battles between the east and west in all of history ("Battle for the West" is a good book on the subject). The timing of the movie isn't coincidental. Food for thought.

Addendum to my previous commentary: There was an interesting article on "300" on ABC News Entertainment By MARCUS BARAM (March 14, 2007): "Does Bush Resemble Leonidas or Xerxes?" Here is a bit that furthers my sentiments:

David George, a professor at St. Anselm's College, recognizes that the battle is "a signature event in the West's consciousness of itself," one that was cast by the Greeks, the Romans and the Byzantines as civilization's triumph over the barbarians. "While the names change and the religions change and the cultures change, there is this notion of Asia as the Eastern threat."

But George contends that casting Bush as Leonidas is quite ironic since Persia was arguably the more civilized society. "It was the Persians who returned the Jews from Babylonian captivity. Zoroastrianism [the Persian religion] is a very open and inclusive religion," he said. "In comparison, the Greeks were incredibly parochial. Sparta was a fascist state."

If you are interested in further reading:
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=2950625&page=1

That was a nice article well done...
It is true that the winner always write the history,
imagine the history if in 1940 Nazi (German Empire)
had win the war... All that u know in nowdays that u learn from school society e.t.c will be different..
[ I beleive that ]

I am Greek.. I haven`t got any problems with the children of persians it is OK people... I think we have same interests...

The movie was 60% good for me 40% bad... From that I hear (here in greece) people beleive that the movie was a nice propaganda of americans ... But they all see the movie and I beleive that they liked it... It is nice to see your ancestors to win..
Greece HISTORY was a sheild for anonymus propaganda...
AND I AM GLAD THAT ALL THE PEOPLE UNDERSTAND THAT AND DONT BLAIM MY COUNTRY...

{ PLZ excuse my english}

While your criticisms are pretty obviously backed up by evidence from the film, it's important to remember that the film is based on a graphic novel, which aims - first and foremost - to emphasise the appealing elements of any story, and secondly to inform, as Victor Davis Hanson, someone you mentioned.

The inherently pederastic nature of the Greek culture (which at the time was the dominant culture of the eastern mediteranean) was repulsive to the Jews. Which is why Judea revolted against the Seleukan Greeks (based in Antioch, now part of Turkey) untill the demise of the Greek rule in Judea.

This is simply not true.
1)One could easily say the inherently pederastic of nature of Jewish culture was what was repulsive.

2) Most Jews at the time embraced Greek culture. We still do. Modern Rabbinic Judaism is inherently Greek. The Maccabees were intolerant religious zealots whose closest analog wold be the Taliban. Ironically within a generation they lost.

I disagree. Rather than "a crude Orientalism and a thinly veiled fascism" the film was quite carefully a beautifully-realized Orientalism and a very overt0 fascism. Art is challenging, and the film quite effectively represented the real nature of the relationships, attitudes, and prejudices manifest in the historical characters themselves, or at least that which would be articulated in their contemporary forms of representation. The film presents that perspective only to celebrate and appreciate the richness of the culture, not to comment on its value, accuracy, or legitimacy. Sure the Orientalist claim that those ancient perspectives (of course, the matter Said and his contemporaries would target is far more recent than the prejudices of the ancient Greeks, though a careful reader of his work will realize his claim is more about the development of Western metropolitan society, to which the culture of Ancient Greece is very significant) permitted, sustained, and encouraged the imperial endeavors and that their remnants risk harming study of "Oriental" regions and their inhabitants, I'm not sure if they would heap scorn on a piece of art seeking to celebrate as interesting, exciting, or complicated the attitudes of an ancient culture.

I think you have made many strong points in your overall analysis of this movie -- if you truly wish to look at from a purely historical standpoint. You had me until you made the stupid remark about "gay men trying to impress each other" and dared to compare modern-day Islamo-terrorists with the 300 Spartans. I'm sorry, but that was just a dumb, thoughtless statement. Unquestionably, there are many things we find in Spartan culture that are disturbing and barbaric, though they were occuring in a civilized society. But, the same could be said of Persia.

At the end of the day, the message of history -- not the movie -- still triumphs. The central and underlying fact that remains is that Persia was on a quest for world domination. Care to argue that? Of course note. Xerxes wasn't seeking the good fortune of Sparta when he came knocking! The bottom line is that Persia invaded Sparta -- not to retaliate (as if Sparta had attacked Persia in some way) nor to liberate any poor, oppressed Spartans from tyranny or other such injustice. Persia wanted to rule the world -- period, which makes them the bad guy in this movie and in the history book, no matter how much anyone may dislike it!

Thankfully, 300 Spartans caught the importance of a valiant death-stand at that fateful moment for it DID send a message to the rest of Greece (which up to that point had been content to tolerate Persian imperialism). It was a message that neutrality was no longer an option. That was the message the U.S. got loud and clear when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. Hopefully (and since you have mentioned the War on Terror I'll go there with you), the nations who have sat back on their haunches in this present day will eventually recognize that the only way Islamo-fascist terrorism (or whatever you want to call it) will be destroyed is when they too finally get involved.

While I consider the propaganda historiography about "the Nazis" as false, I basically would agree with the summary on the movie. I also don't think that the depiction of Xerxes forces is directed against "the orient" - but rather against multiculturalism. Leonidas stood for everything the left hates: Heroism, Patriotism, sacrifice, honor, race quality. While Xerxes promoted materialism, hedonism and multiculturalism.

This is one of the most obsequious articles I've ever read concerning a film. A FILM. This picture was not highlighting "fascist Western values" or displaying "Orientalism". It was glorifying a battle between the Spartans and Persians. Often in films, a story is told in such a way to create a dramatic rift between good and evil, right and wrong. Yes, the Spartans were portrayed as beautiful, strong, and reasonable, while the Persians were portrayed as the deviants. That is how storytelling works. One side is invariably good while the other is decidedly bad.
Get your panties out of a wad and calm it down. There are plenty of people to get all up in arms about something ssssoooooooooo trivial. The world could use a few REAL journalists now and a again.

"Western civilization (which is free, rational and beautiful) has always defended itself against the barbaric East (which is tyrannical, irrational and ugly). And the saga just continues today."

Very true.

Put all of the bickering aside and just see it as a movie that shows people that they can have the courage to stand up for themselves in the face of an opposing force. No matter the force; good, evil, facist or homosexual. It's just an anthem that few can stand against many.

Also, it's a movie based on a graphic novel, that is basically an elongated comic book. Made for excitement and entertainment and profit. A man with swords for arms? Seriously...

You're rant about "Orientalism" being the core of the movie is frankly ridiculous. The movie is based on a comic book or graphic novel not in anyway based on historical fact and is focused mainly on the visual effects and shots. Although the actual ancient Spartans may have been Homo-sexual and fascist as an earlier reader said every movie has to have its clear cut good guys and bad guys so this side of them is greatly exaggerated.The movie is simply that and any half brained westerner will not become an "Orientalist" from watching it i think maybe as a westerner yourself you are reading to much into it and becoming positively discriminate.

This is a movie based on a graphic novel. It is narrated by a Spartan soldier telling this to his troops before battle. Of course he is going to dehumanize his enemies and make elephants and rhinos seem 10 times larger than usual and have Spartans kill them without breaking a sweat. So quit ranting about how this film is so anti-eastern society.

While I have seen mentioned the point that the movie was based on the graphic novel, I haven't seen mentioned that the graphic novel was published in 1998, and the movie follows the plot and dialogue of the graphic novel very closely. For the world's Smarthumbs to say it was designed as pro-Iraq-war propaganda is to call Frank Miller a prophet, as that means he churned out PR material for Bush's war during the Clinton administration. I think the motivation was much more along the lines of "Hey, we made a bunch of money off Sin City - what else have you written, Frank?". Whatever prejudices the movie displays, it's important to remember they were established nearly 10 years ago, and to try and say they're a reflection of anything current is ridiculous. The depiction of Xerxes doesn't resemble Mahmoud Ahmedinejad - it resembles a series of paneled drawings from a book published a decade ago. And as far as pro-Western propaganda goes, a small group of highly-trained soldiers overtaking the armies of a massive empire with a overconfident leader would seem to be much more motivating to extremist Islamic groups than to Americans. Let's look at the movie for what it really is - an epic dramatization designed to put paying moviegoers in theater seats, and make a few billion dollars in the process. And when there's an article in the New York Times about teachers taking their history class students to the movie to learn about Spartans, then we can pick apart the rampant historical inaccuracies. Because until then, it's a moot point.

Its a flippin movie with amazing comic like screan shots and good looking dudes their friggen greek men not us militants so come ur freakin hormones and so what Xerses likes having lesbians in his batcave doesnt mean hes evil and people are hating on the east jeeze the dude just wanted to eat some pizza of the other table and them dudes backlashed on his ass with swords spears and shields o yeah and narly muscles :P but its just a movie you dont take any facts from a movie unless it claims its a INFORMATIVE MOVIE and the sad part is u ppl who critisize it still enjoyed watching the flipping movie so just pop it back in ur dvd player and shut up

Dude. It's a MOVIE.

Relax.

As a native Nigerian, I can see but the underlying context of this article, it is not about the movie but your political agenda. You use this move for it's rough historical background as some sort of ammunition for your political war. Relating the Nazi's to Spartans, calling the westerners idealists of old times. I can tell you no friend of mine, in my country, you would have been secretly eliminated if you wrote such things about our government.

You complain about the westerners ideals of freedom, but you live with such freedoms that they hold in high regard. I wish the people of my country would stand with me and FIGHT for FREEDOM, like the early Americans did. I wish we would not sit and wallow in our own ill fates.

I am the slowest man in the world when it comes to watching movies so I only saw 300 last month.

Orientalist? Well, if it DIDN'T depict the Greek view of Persians as inherently inferior, it would be way off the mark. In most respects the historical context is ripped away. I think very few people have read Herodotus and cannot supply their own. The Greeks did not despise homosexuality. They had a burning contempt for effeminacy. THAT was what they accused the Persians of: opulence, cowardice, and softness. Making sense of that to our opulent, pampered society would be a challenge I think!

If Snyder had gone full-bore as depicting the Spartans as fascist loons & heroic at the same time we could have had a more multi-layered film. War, defensive or offensive, brings out the fascist tendencies in a society. The Spartans were actually a weird mix of fascism, oligarchy, and constitutional monarchy, mixed with some savage KKK style racism. I was raised on the Cornelius Ryan style of WWII epic, Willie and Joe are my idea of soldiers. Even the boast that Spartans fight as a unit is undercut by the many scenes where they break ranks. Thermopylae is superlative source material, I wanted something that felt more connected to it.

The big problem is simple visual over-kill. Xerxes is so weird I just watched with my jaw hanging down. I'm expecting a some scenery chewing between Gerard Butler and Rodrigo Santoro, instead I'm fixed on the 10-foot tall gay robot that rules Persia. Yes, the rhino is historically inaccurate, so is the frickin' TOLKEIN TROLL. I wanted a fast cut to the narrator and someone saying, "They had a troll?" "They had a TROLL!" If this is Orientalism, they've been dipping in the opium supply.

I cannot believe Mr. Akyol seriously wrote a piece on this topic, and tried to make an intelligent analysis. Vehemently arguing against conspiracy theories and then sounding almost like devising one? I think Mr. Akyol needs to take some time off to think about what exactly he thinks about certain issues he writes on. I understand that he likes giving examples in history but I do not think it is working. (Often times his examples are irrelevant, and blurring his thoughts). Then he needs to go over his writings to identify whether there are any confusions, conflicts and inconsistencies. Not only will this help better organize his thoughts but also write well as a columnist.

Actually for what you guys are saying about the helots, or slaves, that the Spartans had; they were conquered people that were allowed to live and in turn worked the fields. Yet amongst themselves Spartans were the most free society that had existed. They, unlike most other Greek societies viewed women as equals and because they were free to exercise they had what were considered the most beautiful women to exist.
The Spartans were fighting for freedom, and their way of life. When a massive army comes to your door and is going to kill you do you sit down and take it or fight back?
Remember the Tyrinians that Alexander the Great literally had to kill off. They never stopped fighting and all ended dying.
It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees... that is the lesson of this MOVIE, which is based on a comic book. you need to stop overanalysing.