Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: bozon on April 05, 2007, 05:42:18 PM
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I just returned from the movies after watching "300".
I am familiar with how Hollywood treats historical stories. Some made up side stories is fine. Change the costumes somewhat for beautification. Even "spice up" the original story by taking some liberties with the historical detail. I can take that.
GOOD GOD! WHAT HAVE THEY DONE?!:O :mad:
I never realized Sauron has extended his conquests from Mordur to Greece. Finding historical inaccuracies is a fun exercise, but in this case it was futile. A few character names, the use of round shields and the red cloaks is all that remains of history.
Forget Athens part in the story, forget authentic costumes, throw history books to the floor and step on them - why oh why did they need to include orcs and trolls as troops of the Persian army. They came right out of lord of the rings! including the disproportional elephants (Uliphants)!
At some point I was waiting for Gandalf to appear with the Ruhirs and save the day...
I hear the next historical movie will be about the battle of Britain. Never in the history of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few elves in golden spitfires that fought rugged, all steel Messerschmidts driven by nazi orcs.
I'm sorry for this outburst. I just feel cheated and felt compelled to warn those who inted to watch it. I should have listed to reason and downloaded it from the web because the producers don't deserve getting the ticket money.
Does everything has to be fantasy ?! :mad:
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Well, it is a pretty average film. The killing soon gets old and I just got bored.
However, historical inaccuracy is not a valid criticism, if you ask me. Herodotus was the classical historian who dealt with the Greek-Persian conflict and he was apt to talk about dog-headed men and ants that dug gold from the earth. 300 is just a spin on the Greek style of 'history' (or storytelling), but perhaps doesn't realise it.
I'd give it 6/10, and wouldn't go out of my way to catch it on TV. Unlike Gladiator.
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You do realize that the movie 300 is based off of a graphic novel? And not the actual battle?
While it was a great ride, I wouldn't say that it is a good movie.
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This wasnt a "history" war film like Letters from Iwo Jima or Alexander or whatnot. It's an action move based on a graphic novel lossely based on the timeperiod.
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Alexander was fantasy too - very little is known about the man or his conquests apart from the bare facts.
Gladiator was a film based on a time period, but it succeeded completely as a film.
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You want a documentary, go watch PBS.
300 was a good film, being what it was intended to be, pure entertainment. I never go to hollywood to get a history lesson.
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I never intended to watch it, but that was good fuel as to why I'd rather skip it.
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Yeah, they really messed up. I mean, come on, they had British accents. If the producers wanted to butch the Greeks up to '11' they should've given them Brooklyn accents.
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Didn't you know that any foreigner in a movie based on a comic book has british or german accents?
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Foreign to whom exactly?
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Is they from Texas? That's your answer right there.
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Ooops, my bad.
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That movie kicked ass. Popcorn, drink, thousands of dead Persians, and boobs. wtf is the problem?
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:rofl slash
i havent seen it yet...thinking about it....
Hijack on: Anyone seen "blades of glory"...do you recomend it? Hijack off
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at then end there, i was expecting captain sparrow to coming swooping in on the black pearl and sink the entire persian fleet.
some good fight scenes tho.
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The next thing your gonna tell me is Ben Afflek didn't fight in every major battle of WW2!
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300 is based on a comic book. Entertainment purposes only.
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Originally posted by AquaShrimp
300 is based on a comic book. Entertainment purposes only.
I didn't know that. I didn't come to learn history, it's just that I don't really like fantasy. It just felt to me like really bad taste that didn't contribute anything. The sex scences were also pointless, except the usual added value of a pretty naked girl. But this is the 21st century, we have the internet for that... :)
True, nice fight scences though.
The only fantasy books I ever enjoyed was Lord of the rings and Hobbit, I never finished anything else. This is probably why I also don't like "fantasy" movies.
With therapy and time, I may get over the shock... :p
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Never ever forget the truism about hollywierd. Never let the truth get in the way of a story.
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So nobody watches previews anymore? I find peoples' surprise and outrage to be a little... umm... surprising and outrageous. :rolleyes:
Do people really have such a hard time separating real-life from fantasy?
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Originally posted by bozon
I hear the next historical movie will be about the battle of Britain. Never in the history of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few elves in golden spitfires that fought rugged, all steel Messerschmidts driven by nazi orcs.
Orcs? pffffff... Everyone knows the Luftwaffe used gargoyles numpty...
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0969322/
(http://www.scifi.com/reignofthegargoyles/images/main.jpg)
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I thought this was funny....bunch of photoshopped 300 pictures.
Possibly NSFW
http://www.b15sentra.net/forums/showthread.php?t=147338
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Originally posted by Maverick
Never ever forget the truism about hollywierd. Never let the truth get in the way of a story.
but I am surprised that hollywierd did not try to play up the brokeback elements of the spartans for all its worth
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(http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70/BigTon/Jengaaaa.gif)
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Originally posted by Goth
I never go to hollywood to get a history lesson.
Yep.
I thought the movie was aight. I agree with Bozon's critique with regards to the fantasy element. I thought it was a better movie without it. But eh, whatever. Worth the price of admition in my opinion.
-Sik
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bozon,
I share your disgust with films that pretend to be based on the historical record and have nothing to do with it. I haven't seen 300, but I probably won't given what I've heard about the embellishment.
Dowding,
You have a good point that the absolute accuracy of ancient historians is often in question. Still, from what I've heard of 300 it takes liberty to run miles away from anything the ancients ever recorded. I have no problem with fantasy, but when it confuses itself with history (Last Samurai) I have a big objection. Historical inaccuracy is a valid criticism in films that act like they are historical works.
laser and grunherz,
I don't care if this version is based off a comic book, it has presented itself as historical in its publicity and that is just not cool for me. Too few people now a days have a real appreciation for history. It's hard to encourage good historical perception when you have terentino, cruise and many others caching in on psudo-history.
I caution you in thinking Letters from Iwo Jima was completely a historical film. It was Clint Eastwood's presentation of history, and while I agree with his presentation, it is only that. It is not actually what it was like on Iwo Jima. Nothing can be. The difference between Eastwood's film and some of the other farce-history films is that Eastwood acknowledged fully that he was making a presentation, and kept as closely as possible in a cinematic format to the historical record. If you watch the credits you will see actual images from the battle that Eastwood has directly portrayed in the film. Still, it is only a portrayal. Wonderful, but it can never be complete.
Goth said it best with, "I never go to hollywood to get a history lesson."
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A 10th grade history teacher here in my county is giving extra credit to his class for going to see "300". He is telling the kids it's based on facts. It really worries me what it will be like when my daughter is old enough to be in that class.
Lambo
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Originally posted by lambo31
A 10th grade history teacher here in my county is giving extra credit to his class for going to see "300". He is telling the kids it's based on facts. It really worries me what it will be like when my daughter is old enough to be in that class.
Lambo
Thinking the Persian Army consists of Orcs is probably the least of your concerns when it comes to public education :)
-Sik
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300 was an awesome flick. Pure entertainment with some Greeks kicking some ass. I dont understand how one likes gladiator and not 300. 300 was far ore entertaining. To each his own I guess.
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the whole movie looked like a comic, the enviroment, the colors all
looks so unreal.
Compared to Gladiator, 300 is fast food, its an FX movie, blood splater
everywhere like in kill bill hehe
it was entertaining tho.
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68Hawk - I dug out The Histories by Herodotus which has the description of the events around Thermopylae. Some of the parts of the film are taken directly from the account. However, Leonidas dies before the rest of his troops, and the Thespians are present as a separate force holding a bit of raised ground near the entrance to the pass.
Furthermore, the orcs and plague infested soldiers seem to be missing from even Herodotus' fertile imagination. ;)
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Lambo, that kind of thing right there is why these movies disgust me. Honestly thats not even the movie so much as the idiot 'history teacher'. If someone who (supposedly) knows what they're talking about can have the issue go right over their head, what are people who aren't trained in history supposed to think?
Dowding, I really should read that. Never been much into the ancient period myself, except for Caesar and the late Republic. Greek history has never really interested me. It's a lot of embellishment and myth thrown in with actual history. Its unavoidable unless one sticks purely to the archaeological record.
I watched the History channel's dissection of 300, and when they can find so much divergence from history you know it's bad. I guess I just don't want to spend my time on something thats just another piece of eye candy. Shiny things just don't catch my eye anymore. What are we fish?
TMNT was great though! I highly recommend it to anyone.
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not bad, for a movie made 100% behind blue screen, filmed in a warehouse in Montreal,
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Originally posted by ghi
not bad, for a movie made 100% behind blue screen, filmed in a warehouse in Montreal,
The technical aspects of it are very good. Had it been a pure fantasy film it would have been a decent movie. The tasteless history/fantasy mix is really what killed it.
Movies today have way better photographers, animators, special effect, sound and the rest of the technical production, then good directors, script writers or... well... good taste.
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Thanks for those redux pics and clips. Those were funny!
I went to go see 300 to be entertained, knowing what it was about beforehand. I was entertained. The fighting scenes were cool.
"Are you not entertained!" lol
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Yes, 300 was based on a graphics novel, but more importantly 300 is a warrior's tale ... and warrior's tales have much in common with fisherman's tales.
Also notice that the movie started and ended with one of the surviving 300 telling the story of the glorious battle to the young new soldiers. Of course the war elephants are the size of Oliphants (or whatever they're called in LOTR), of course the enemy is described as foul monsters, of course the traitor is described as a horribly disfigured fiend of a man with no honor.
It's a warrior's tale.
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Btw. here's the "PG" version trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caaQ4VT9GY8
:lol
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Originally posted by Viking
Yes, 300 was based on a graphics novel, but more importantly 300 is a warrior's tale ... and warrior's tales have much in common with fisherman's tales.
Also notice that the movie started and ended with one of the surviving 300 telling the story of the glorious battle to the young new soldiers. Of course the war elephants are the size of Oliphants (or whatever they're called in LOTR), of course the enemy is described as foul monsters, of course the traitor is described as a horribly disfigured fiend of a man with no honor.
It's a warrior's tale.
That's a good way to look at it. I hadn't considered that. Thanks.
-Sik
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Just saw it, i did enjoy it, an bit too many bravehearth speaches, but all in all i enjoyed it. Good action.
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Personally I loved it, both the scripts and the effects.
Guess everybody has different taste, I never went to watch it to get a history lesson.
Was an awsome movie that accomplished the one thing a movie must accomplish... entertain.
I do agree I would have liked it better without some of the more fantasy like figures.
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I showed an few clips of 300 to my friends 13 yr old son the other day, this is his words :
ROFLMAD! They are OWNING people in their Underwear!!! HAHAHA! What the **** is this crap?!
So much for an history lesson :lol
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Why would anyone go to a theater showing a holywierd production film aimed at entertainment and making money, expecting to see a documentary? :huh If you want history watch PBS. You'll have a better chance at getting what you expect there.
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Originally posted by lambo31
A 10th grade history teacher here in my county is giving extra credit to his class for going to see "300". He is telling the kids it's based on facts. It really worries me what it will be like when my daughter is old enough to be in that class.
Lambo
That's to bad. The Director is even quoted saying the flim is totally blown up for Hollywood, that if he filmed the fight scenes and formations historical accurate it would make for a boring movie.