Movie Review: 300

Caught this new movie recently. I was initially a bit hesitant to watch it, thinking that it'll be a typical guy-sy movie with lots of blood and gore. And true enough, it was! But nonetheless, it was quite a good watch for even a girly girl like me (though there weren't any cute pink fluffy creatures singing while dancing in formation!)

So what is it about besides men (lots of em!) with really sculptured bodies and fantastic six-packs trotting about the screen with loincloths and cloaks to show off their bodies? It's actually a story of courage, team spirit, strategy and valour. It's a story of how this legendary King Leonidas (now I know how the chocolate got its name!) of Sparta led 300 of his best soldiers to fight against a marauding wave of Persians intent on conquering the whole of Asia and Europe. His valiant act inspired the rest of Greece to unite and fight against the Persians, hence foiling their ambition to take over Europe.

I was very impressed at their fighting strategy and how they fought as one, each always looking out for and protecting his neighbour. The way they have been solely trained for combat to protect their country and their freedom allowed them to laugh in the face of impending death and to embrace it, each fighting to die a glorious death for their country.

300 inspired me to google up Sparta and I found some interesting facts about them on Wikipedia:

1. It was a very tough military country with no luxuries and laws regulating everything - hence the term Spartan which we use today!
2. A child was examined at birth to see if it was weak or small. Any form of imperfection meant death for the child as only the perfect and strong were allowed to live to ensure no imperfection entered the society.
3. Male children were taken from their mothers at 7 to be trained; very brutally, physically and mentally.
4. Spartan women enjoyed a status, power and respect that was unknown in the rest of the classical world. They were educated and allowed to hold properties.

Those times were tough times in Ancient Greece! Overall, the movie is pretty gory at certain parts with limbs flailing all over the place, blood spurting everywhere and heads being cut off. It has it's LOTR moments too with Persian mammoths and strange beasts running at our poor Spartans.

But having said that, it's still a pretty good watch if you can stomach the gore. Look beyond the video-game like killing and you'll see a fighting spirit in the little team of Spartans which I'm sure the world or Bolehland would be a much better place if we all had but a fraction of the spirit they did.