Thermopylae

Heading into the first important film of 2007, there were three ways to think about it. The first was to consider it within the context of the sword-and-sandal epic, a Hollywood genre as old and common as the romantic comedy. Films like Ben-Hur, Gladiator and Spartacus had all gone before 300, and had set the bar quite high. The second light to cast 300 in was an historical one - looking back on the conflict that took place between the Greeks and the Persians, what transpired, and how it's portrayed. Finally, consider the previous work of those involved with the film, particularly Frank Miller, the graphic novelist whose last effort, Sin City, was so full of debauchery that it made Showgirls look like Sesame Street.

These things in mind, I was taking 300 with a grain of salt. Miller's history as someone with little restraint, combined with the high standards the film had to live up to, not only from its predecessors but the ridiculous level of hype surrounding it, had me wondering if it could meet anyone's expectations. So, after two hours of Spartans, swords, and Persians, I came to the conclusion that it didn't meet my expectations. It exceeded them.

Firstly, Gerard Butler (Phantom of the Opera) gives a stunning performance as the Spartan leader, King Leonidas. Full of the requisite strength and bombast, it was a pleasant surprise to find that he was able to inject what could have been a stereotype with such humor, emotion and depth. Combined with a thinly veiled Scottish accent, such characteristics strongly reminded me of a young Sean Connery - powerful and resolute, but still human enough to joke about being civil on a battlefield littered with fallen Persian conscripts. He's the center of 300's universe - everyone else just orbits around him and hopes to catch some of the energy he exudes throughout the film.

The second star in 300 was the effects. These days, special effects are commonplace, a fixture as permanent in films as the SteadyCam. It's rare to notice them anymore. In fact, most of the time, they're doing their job if they're invisible. Director Zack Snyder (Dawn of the Dead) and his crew disagree. Nearly every shot in this film takes your breath away, even if it's designed to be relatively ordinary. Sepia toning, combined with using traditional film rather than digital photography for effects shots, created a look unlike any other - not even Sin City looked this good. There's something to be said for choosing a different wave in a sea of sameness, and the direction this film took was so bold, it's bound to get noticed come awards season next year.

But disparate elements like acting and effects wouldn't work well together were it not for the synchronous in-betweens like the score, supporting cast, choreography and story. The music in this film was dynamic, to say the least. I was more than a little leery of a score that was supposed to include rock, chanting, and classical overtones, but it worked. Nothing was overdone and it felt refreshingly different to have someone other than Hans Zimmer or John Williams conducting the melodies. The supporting cast worked for two reasons. The first was that none of them overplayed their part, and they fit together like the pieces of a puzzle, rather than feeling like the quickly assembled all-star teams of pictures like Babel or Ocean's Eleven. The second was that none of them were played by Nicolas Cage, Brad Pitt, or Tom Cruise. Because most of the cast members were relative unknowns, you were able to connect with them as their characters, rather than thinking of the actor behind the armor.

Finally, the choreography and story in 300 felt like a dance - there were certain steps that needed to be taken, but a lot of it didn't go according to custom. Improvisation in place of sticking by traditional standards served the film well. Battle scenes deviated from the recent trend of "let's speed everything up so you have no idea who's winning" and drew back, revealing a beauty and patience unseen in an epic for some time. The story paced wonderfully, with subtle foreshadowing juxtaposed against a quiet crafting of the context of the age. There were several points at which the film could have easily fallen back on a cliche, but opted for originality over safety, again employing a boldness that the Spartans would have been proud of.

Despite its greatness, 300 wasn't perfect. Lines like, "Freedom isn't free at all," and the undertones of fighting for democracy felt vaguely like conservative rhetoric. Scenes including goat-men and monstrous hybrids of Jabba the Hutt and a hacksaw were left to the suspension of disbelief and were never adequately explained. But truly, 300 was incredible, dynamic and original. If only more filmmakers felt the need to challenge the status quo - to make a film about battle that didn't involve World War II, to use filming techniques that no one's used before, and to cast actors that haven't already worked on ten projects this year - then maybe the odds of finding an original voice in Hollywood wouldn't feel like three hundred to a million.