Comments on: 300: nice use of color

By: Matt

Matt — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:53:25 +0000

“no god would be stupid enough to reject the offer to become warlord of all Greece and avoid certain death.”

Jesus Christ from the Bible most certainly did this very thing. Satan tempted Jesus by offering him power over all lands and Jesus turned him down which eventually led to his death. Not trying to offend you or anything… just saying that particular statement is a bit incorrect.

By: Kiya

Kiya — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:42:05 +0000

Just a comment about your green arrows–remember, as inviting as those open coves look, they were actually miserable patches of sea to navigate. This is why the Spartans were so militaristic: they had no real easy access to a safe sea port, or location to set up a sea port. Sparta itself was located between two enormous mountain ranges, with limited farmland; to get enough resources to survive, Sparta conquered and enslaved its neighbors–who became helots, essentially slaves–and lived in constant fear of revolt. So they trained up an army to keep the helots down.
Sorry for that small side track, but its a roundabout way of saying that landing where the green arrows are wouldn’t have been effective, and might have resulted in the loss or more Persian ships. That all said–was the red arrow where they actually landed, or where the Persians landed in the film 300? Because I thought that Thermopylae was actually on the Attican Peninsula, above the Isthmus of Corinth.

By: John

John — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 03:03:40 +0000

Good god, what kind of history courses do the average Joe take? Greece is the first major civilisation in Europe. It’s bloody important to have an overview.

Not quite sure what part you’re referring to with ‘my commentary’.
The film is based on a comic, which simplified the story to the point where you know just enough to frame the glorification of one of the most famous last stands in history. It’s most certainly not meant to be historically accurate (a friend recently suggested to me that the historical inaccuracies/absurdities in the film would make for a good drinking game).

If you’re being serious about the landing point, I don’t know. Possibly the Athenian navy had them worried enough to land quickly. Possibly they didn’t know the terrain well enough to see the danger ahead, or they anticipated pushing through the choke point before any Greek forces arrived, or figured that 250000 soldiers (the conservative estimate of the Persian army) should be able to brush aside any small Greek force rushed to the area.

By: numerodix

numerodix — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 09:26:00 +0000

That’s sorta the point here, John. The Average Joe didn’t know this either coming out of the movies. Still, aside from this point, is there anything about the battle that makes my commentary invalid?

By: John

John — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 18:10:57 +0000

Eh? The Spartans didn’t ‘find’ all those troops. They already had them, they just weren’t deployed at Thermopylae.

Come on Martin, read up on the actual battle before criticising a film loosely based on it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Thermopylae

By: erik

erik — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 08:55:31 +0000

Nicely written and this:

“They also use this Matrix-like technique where the action slows down and the Persian soldier is moving in slow motion, while the Spartan navigates the space/time continuum so he can swing his sword in real time during a slow motion sequence. No wonder they were so hard to defeat.”

is just precious