Don’t worry all, I’m still alive (though a bag of blood short!. The title is taken from my friend, who described the movie to me in 2 words “blood and tits”. It’s kinda true.
I donated yesterday (in under 5 minutes actually), and there was such a big lineup I was almost late to see 300. Unfortunately, I realized I should’ve probably lied down for a bit longer as I nearly passed out standing on the bus. Luckily, another student from my school offered me her seat for the last few minutes of the ride. I sat in the small bus terminal for a few minutes, then my classmate and I went and saw 300.
Wow! I have not seen that many built men EVER. Some of them had such large legs I thought they were tree trunks. When I told my classmate that there’s actually 3 trannies in the movie, we played “Spot the Tranny”. We found all 3!
That leads to the next point. The Queen character was probably one of the most brilliantly created “strong” woman. There were no hissy fits, no skanking it up, and even when she at the mercy of the counsellor, she found a way to get back at him for raping her (sorry for the spoilers!). She was probably one of the first characters in any movie that I did not find that was just inserted to be someone’s lover or a plot device. Alot of movies I have found use women as plot devices and not actual stand alone characters. Just look at any movie: Pirates of the Caribbean? Kierra Knightly has no other purpose than to advance the plot and be the love interest (even going as far as causing a slight love triangle).
Why?
I don’t think they have any idea how to actually write a stand alone woman character without finding it a hassle.
Think about it.
Most women in historical context weren’t warriors; if they make a movie such as Arthur, the woman is a barbarian with a slight injury, overplaying it for pity, versus the young boy who was sick and dying in the same jail. She was nothing short of annoying. Otherwise, they’ll make her a princess, played by the prettiest actress they can get.
If they try to make her a love interest from the beginning, then she automatically becomes some lusty busty whore, attracting the attention of the main character from her pitiful situation, or even worse, someone has paid/bet someone to go out with her (10 things I hate about you, etc). There is always one girl who is “non-conformist”, living her life by “trying to be different”. Even worse, are the ones where they transform the shy nerdy ones to sex goddesses.
There are great women characters, don’t get me wrong, but they are usually
A) not the main character/ unimportant supporting character.
B) they are too young or two old
C) They were in a Frank Miller movie (even though he’s obsessed with hookers, they’re pretty down to earth).
I think it’s very hard to protray a realistically sound and sane female. Look at the W-network (Or as I like to call it, “watch-susie-get-beaten-again-movie-network”). Almost any show that showcases a female as the main character is so out there it’s almost hard to watch. Sex in the City type characters are rampant, or the strong dominate female that can do EVERYTHING and ANYTHING. It’s worse than watching a 3 ring circus going round and a round. Beaten, abused, or Harlequin-romance-novel characters are much easier to keep the story going than to use some effort.
So what can we do about it?
Short of writing my own scripts and submitting them to Hollywood? Hell if I know.
But I do know that I enjoyed Dining in Hell last night.
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March 23, 2007 at 11:06 am
barsin
Rape? I thought she offered herself to him, in exchange for his support of Leonidas. He just didn’t make it pleasant for her.
This is a chick flick all the way. A bunch of pretty boys with breast implants, dressed in red capes and hot-pants, twirling around like barishnikov. Put your helmets on boys, wouldn’t want to mess up those pretty cheekbones.
Also, Leonidas defers to Queen Gorgo in every possible decision that he makes, even waiting for her to give the final nod before he kicks the emissary into the well. He also places ‘insulting my queen’ at the same level of severity as dropping the heads and crowns of kings on his city steps, and threatening his people with slavery and death. (even though she insulted the emissary. he merely questioned why she was speaking among men, and that’s why he had to die)
March 23, 2007 at 1:32 pm
Fred X
I’ve touched on this issue myself before, and I do agree with much of what you say
I actually think modern, hollywoodised women SPOIL films
I HATE watching an otherwise good film OR tv show- only to have it ruined by the prescense of some annoying, self entitled bitch who I literally want to kick in the face
LOL
In fact- I can’t escape them, because a) they’re everywhere, and b) there might be some vital peice of information pertinent to the rest of the film in their crappy scenes, forcing me to watch them when I could be going to the toilet or rummaging through the cupboards for more crisps to eat
Fuck I hate them
March 23, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Peregrine John
I know this sounds odd, but you have bolstered my interest in the movie (I’m way way behind on films) more than anyone else has. However, barsin has the absolute first in ever calling 300 a “chick flick”…
March 23, 2007 at 8:50 pm
K.
Barsin- Well she didn’t look too happy about it
I’m sorry if I used the wrong words to describe it.
Chick Flick? A Frank Miller Novel/Movie? That’s the first. The only thing I found feminine or chickflick like was that they shaved (and I believe that’s historically correct).
Leonidas defers to the queen because she’s his other half in Ruling. Wouldn’t a Queen look to her king also? Also, with the severity level of insulting his queen, he lists it far after the other offenses. The Emissary had to die because he had insulted the country (by offering them to submit or die). Spartans would never submit to anyone else, even before death.
Fred - I sometimes think watching movies without a female character is actually the only way to avoid them. Fav. movie of all time is Man on Fire, and the only female character is really the little girl and the mother who rarely shows up.
I usually just fastforward through the woman’s scenes unfortunately.
Peregrine- You need to see it. It’s visually pleasing, and all the shots are extremely artistic. The fight scenes are beautifully done, and there’s so many awesome shots of the guy screaming (We dine in HELL!).
The only thing is that there’s some scenes inbetween that feel a bit abrupt, like they couldn’t handle all that testosterone so they had to take slight break
March 24, 2007 at 4:08 am
Craig
FredX - come on, don’t hold back, tell us how you really feel!
barsin - I’ve been watching Rome on HBO and it just occured to me the other night that a major theme of that series is how the women pulled the strings and manipulated the men behind the scenes, out of their desires, jealousies, and resentments. Well, after all, wasn’t Helen of Troy “the face that launched a thousand ships”?
K - I saw Master and Commander a few months ago, and it struck me how rare it is nowadays to see a movie that only features manly men! There was no love interest, no romantic triangles, just men aboard the ship, the way it really was. I think the studios are afraid to make movies like that these days.
March 24, 2007 at 6:43 am
barsin
K: Actually the insult comes right between the other two I listed. Kings heads, insult, death and slavery. Frank millers other movie was about avenging a woman (goldie, elevated to the status of a goddess in the mind of the lunk because she had sex with him), defending a girl from the yellow bastard, and defending a bunch of hookers who we find out are really tough badasses that don’t need no help in the first place. All of the villians are men with sick, depraved sexual or psuedo-sexual desires. The message we get from the heroes is: to protect and avenge women is admirable, even at the expense of your own life, but never forget they don’t really need your sorry ass anyway.
Craig: Yeah, I’ve always heard that, it’s what passes for common wisdom. It’s probably as true as ‘behind every great man is a woman…. who knows how to cook.’ And we all know that’s not true, these days.
March 27, 2007 at 7:47 am
wolverine
300 was an interesting masterpiece. Somewhat historically inacurate, but interesting none the less.
The story has always facinated me. What bravery it took for 300 men to square off with a million man army. It took balls of brass the size of watermellons to do that. Although, the Spartans lost that battle, those 300 had a major role in winning the war. Although no exact numbers exist, some have estimated those 300 to have killed 30,000 to 100,000 persians, depending on which historian you read.
A lesson could be taken here. A few can stop many. Perhaps we should stop pussyfooting around an tell the feminists what they really are, the bigest self inflicted joke the world will ever see.
As for being equals of men, women will never be that. They have to deny a major part of themselves to be this. When women and men deny a part of themselves, it’s an emotional trainwreck looking for a time and place to happen. I would say that when men start trying to become women, violence happens, and vise versa. Perhaps when we allow men to be men, and women to be women, the domestic violence rates will go down.
Back to the movie. This movie allowed the men to be men. Yes, Leonidus did look for his wife’s approval before kicking the emisary down the well, but, she had been the one insulted as well. The queen wasn’t afraid to be a woman either. I didn’t see her try to manipulate her husband. She tried to help him make a decision. She did ask some questions, but she left the ultimate decision up to him. The ultimate compliment to a man is to trust him to use his best judgment. To not trust him hurts beyond measure. He no longer feels like a man.
Well, this is my 2 cents.
March 27, 2007 at 1:33 pm
feminist_scum
I watched that 10 things I hate about you movie a few weeks ago, K. What ruined it for me was the fact one of the main characters was a femcunt.
March 28, 2007 at 5:53 am
Da Whale Boy
if the 300 spartan man-boy lovers invaded Nevis we would have given them some farm tilled canteloupe and told them to leave us alone while we party, they would have been speechless
November 28, 2007 at 8:38 pm
daz
300 is totally a chick flick. The presence of Gorgo ensures that from the beginning where Leonidas needs her permission to kick the messenger into the well right until the end with the king’s ridiculous speech (my queen…my wife….my love). The death is total fantasy as we know that Leonidas was killed early in the battle and his men defended his body until they themselves died.
What I dont’ understand is this: When Alexander came out, Greeks went ballistic over the claims that he was bisexual, something considered quite normal back then. BUT….when 300 comes out, they say nothing about the greatest Spartan King being portrayed as a henpecked wimp who gets told by his wife “If you lose the battle, don’t bring your ass home alive…which is what “come home with your shield or on it” means) and they say nothing. He even needs her to make the damn decision to go to Thermopylae for him. Which leads me to conclude that it must be considered more manly in modern Greece to be a cuckold than a homosexual.