Can you go too far with special effects?

Rating: 4/10 (19 April 2007)

The fight scenes were masterly choreographed in this movie however the thing that let the movie down so much was the background and the movie makers over use of Special effects. Watch the movie and i guarantee there are very few times when the characters aren't standing against a green screen with computer generated graphic behind them. Having read the story of the battle at Thermopylae it instantly jumps out as the father of all tales of courage in the face of adversary. There are countless tales in history that see a repeat of this tale where a group of men stand their ground against all odds knowing that their sacrifice is for the greater good. Now with this in mind i was pretty keen to see the movie "300" and see how film would portray the characters i had created in my mind. To say the least i was sorely disappointed. Special effects do enhance most movies. Lord of the Rings, Matrix and Gladiator are excellent examples of when they are used. The mastery of these special effects is the tweening of computer-generated effects to real life scenes to trick the eye into believing something is real when it clearly is not. I do realise that this is an adaptation of the comic and therefore many of the characters are taken straight from the comic pages (i.e. Xerxes and Ephialtes the traitor). However by doing this it distorts the reality of the story so that an audience watching is numbed into a fantasy version of the events that took place. The fight scenes become more palatable as sitting in the comfort of your armchair your brain is constantly reminded that this is not real. I think this lessens the impact this movie could have had on viewers. Im not going to even talk about the lack of a story line however the intro and explanation of Spartan culture was good. My advice if you had a second crack at making this movie would be to set it on location and make it properly. Otherwise you could have saved your money and just made an animated cartoon.