silly in the "rather awful" sense
I have just seen 300 for the first time, and it is a silly film (and, I deduce, comic book as well).
"We fight for freedom! Yay freedom! We totally fucking love freedom!
"Just, you know, not the freedom for boys to grow up to be anything other than bloodthirsty glory-obsessed warriors.
"Oh, and not for the feeble or disfigured. We kill them. At birth. Examine our babies extra careful to make sure no freaks and runts accidentally slip through to have the freedom to even live.
"And no freedom for the working class, either, of course. They're just chattel, not real people (see actual ancient Greek society)."
What's truly queasying is that the first two hypocrisies are actually demonstrated within the movie, but without criticism, implied or otherwise; the first in fact being uncompromisingly idealized despite the blatantly inhuman lengths the fictional Spartans supposedly go to condition their male children as warriors.
Women are, as expected, largely presented as prizes for and accessories to men, though most of it does not trespass beyond what can grudgingly be excused as an artifact of the time period; in fact, historical accuracy is likely partially set aside in favor of giving the movie's sole real female character - Sparta's queen - the power and autonomy necessary to have a proper role in the story. Not that that role isn't still gendered.
To a grotesque extreme, too, with one particular event. The queen seeks the aid of an influential senator to convince Sparta to join her husband in combat. He sets his price at carnal knowledge of her, to which she submits, the movie then going out of its way to make it clear the experience is miserable for her.
In the end though doing this avails her nothing. Much as it avails the movie nothing. If she had refused, all of the events that followed could and probably would have still occured exactly the same way, save a single inconsequential and easily replaced line of dialog. Her submission (and consequent misery) serves no purpose to the story at all whatsoever - and being so absent of purpose only makes the underlying message all the harder to ignore:
The heroic king is asked to kneel before the Persian empire or risk suffering/death to all of his people. The heroic queen is asked to fuck a senator or risk suffering/death to all of her people.
The heroic king resists. The heroic queen surrenders.
Men gain what they want through their own efforts. Women gain what they want by submitting to the ever-so-capable men.
Men fight. Women get fucked.
Bull. Shit.
Of course, it also could be some sort of deranged cautionary tale, intended (consciously or otherwise) to dissuade women from submitting to this kind of thing. In which case: There's quite e-fucking-nough of those kinds of tales, already, Frankie-boy. Maybe a positive example for once, where the queen tells the senator to go fuck himself, and things turn out no worse for it, would serve the "cause" better, hm?
"We fight for freedom! Yay freedom! We totally fucking love freedom!
"Just, you know, not the freedom for boys to grow up to be anything other than bloodthirsty glory-obsessed warriors.
"Oh, and not for the feeble or disfigured. We kill them. At birth. Examine our babies extra careful to make sure no freaks and runts accidentally slip through to have the freedom to even live.
"And no freedom for the working class, either, of course. They're just chattel, not real people (see actual ancient Greek society)."
What's truly queasying is that the first two hypocrisies are actually demonstrated within the movie, but without criticism, implied or otherwise; the first in fact being uncompromisingly idealized despite the blatantly inhuman lengths the fictional Spartans supposedly go to condition their male children as warriors.
Women are, as expected, largely presented as prizes for and accessories to men, though most of it does not trespass beyond what can grudgingly be excused as an artifact of the time period; in fact, historical accuracy is likely partially set aside in favor of giving the movie's sole real female character - Sparta's queen - the power and autonomy necessary to have a proper role in the story. Not that that role isn't still gendered.
To a grotesque extreme, too, with one particular event. The queen seeks the aid of an influential senator to convince Sparta to join her husband in combat. He sets his price at carnal knowledge of her, to which she submits, the movie then going out of its way to make it clear the experience is miserable for her.
In the end though doing this avails her nothing. Much as it avails the movie nothing. If she had refused, all of the events that followed could and probably would have still occured exactly the same way, save a single inconsequential and easily replaced line of dialog. Her submission (and consequent misery) serves no purpose to the story at all whatsoever - and being so absent of purpose only makes the underlying message all the harder to ignore:
The heroic king is asked to kneel before the Persian empire or risk suffering/death to all of his people. The heroic queen is asked to fuck a senator or risk suffering/death to all of her people.
The heroic king resists. The heroic queen surrenders.
Men gain what they want through their own efforts. Women gain what they want by submitting to the ever-so-capable men.
Men fight. Women get fucked.
Bull. Shit.
Of course, it also could be some sort of deranged cautionary tale, intended (consciously or otherwise) to dissuade women from submitting to this kind of thing. In which case: There's quite e-fucking-nough of those kinds of tales, already, Frankie-boy. Maybe a positive example for once, where the queen tells the senator to go fuck himself, and things turn out no worse for it, would serve the "cause" better, hm?