300

[papa_will]

When I first found out there was going to be a movie about 300 Greeks making a last stand, I was excited. See, the only time I'd heard of a fighting force of 300 was that Sacred Band of Thebes, 150 pairs of boyfriends. Okay, well, this movie isn't about that.
Maybe there should be one! But, my boyfriend wanted to see it. Let's go

Comments

[ex_akai_sen]

...that...sucks.

[mossunicorn]

It's very strange indeed that they totally ignored the history. Oh, wait, this is Hollywood, where most movies 'based on' anything real or which was written originally as a book means 'we like these three ideas and everything else goes out the window'. Odds are? Someone just found a quick synopsis of the battle (if it was even real) and ran with it. I think the 300 was supposed to refer to the year, though.

I suppose we can be brave and look on IMDB.com later to see if the TV series suffers from the same problems. (Peril of playing an game with a heavy Greco-Roman slant: people will tell you these things.)

[papa_will]

No, don't blame Hollywood for this one. It's more or less scene-for-scene from a graphic novel.

BTW, thanks for posting; I could've sworn I wrote this for Queer_Rage, but I guess it's on my journal instead.

[iisz]

A thing that I found interesting about Sparta is that the women were allowed much more freedom (Read could go outside and conduct business) and all they had to do was let their boys go starve by being homeless, and if they survived, being trained as soldiers.

That seems like a horrible choice.

You know that the Spartan boys were assigned a trainer, and lover, while being trained. So I am confused in the *movie* they call the Athenians boy lovers? Because Sparta had no end (pun always intended) of boy loving.

Hi, i wandered over from AMA. I though I might friend you, if you are okay with that.

[papa_will]

Works for me! Any friend is a good friend (unless it's MySpace. Ew.)

[iisz]

Yay!

You will have to friend me back if you want to read any posts, they are generally friends only.

[papa_will]

As I continued to research a bit, the official reason that the historical inaccuracy isn't absolutely glaring is that the Spartans were somewhat quicker to adopt the ideal of Platonic Love (i.e. passionate but chaste, not the modern derivation)

...So, men eying up boys, and perhaps being a little too friendly about teaching them how to play the harp, but no banging. But believing that Athens "did it" and Spartans "never do it" is like saying that nobody in The Bible Belt has gay sex, and 100% of San Fran does (hi, that's a 25% reported gay population. Not even a majority!!)

[kdcayuga]

I know this has nothing to do with this, but I lost your email address. A friend of mine from Ithaca is looking to attend a Beltane celebration, and I said I'd ask my people who know about such things about this. Do you know of any groups in the Buffalo/Rochester/Syracuse area that are doing one this year?

take care and be well,
Katie D.

[kdcayuga]

Oh and I just saw 300 the other day finally. What was with the boy lover comment? come on. Basically there was a lot of blood, and while in some ways it may have been pretty film, I certainly am glad that I didn't have to pay to see it (a friend took me).