A work of art based on a work of art based on a work of art...

Rating: 9/10 (22 March 2007)

This was a truly stunning movie and it exceeded my expectations. Every moment was a visual treat, and my jaw literally dropped several times. It really was clear to see that it's origin was graphic novel, as I could appreciate the composition and coloring of most every shot.
I want to talk about art. I'ts really clear by reading some of the other reviews that some people simply don't get it. I have read reviews criticizing the ab brigade, and the "cartoony" feel. Um... my advice is to plug this into Google:
Leonidas at Thermopylae, Jacques-Louis David (1814)
I am sure that any artsy type will be pleased to agree that David did "cartoony" paintings. They called them "neo classical" paintings, though, and they were all the rage to portray Greek events about 200 years ago....
Its clear to me that Frank Miller was highly influenced by David's depictions of ancient greeks in his neo-classical paintings, and the movie, in turn, translated this influence to the screen. When *I* watched it, I had a nagging feeling I was watching a neo classical painting come to life - I was aware that the color corrections and shadows were intended to invoke this feeling.
Back in the 80's someone did a music video of a painting come to life - paintings have different shadows than real life and they had to paint the people in this kind of an exaggerated shadow in order to get real people to resemble painted ones. The end result was amazing - everyone "oooh'd" over it. So they do the same thing in this movie but it seems not many got that its supposed to invoke the feeling of a neo classical painting, its not "bad color correction" lol! Oh DOH! Hey, MAYBE they did that on purpose.
Complaints about caricatures and simple dialogue are just silly. It's a graphic novel! How much dialogue and depth do you think they can fit in a graphic novel? Its not like you can fit a 4 page dialogue in one of those squares. Graphic novels by necessity are more art and less story.
And complaints about racism? Again, I direct you to our famous dead artist, Jaques Louis David, who spent a lot of time painting white greeks. It is just how it was done back then - and even before then. Da Vinci painted a white Jesus in one of the most famous paintings of all time. Do you think they intended any insult to people of our time? As for Persians being portrayed as bad guys...were they not at that battle? Were they not trying to take over Greece? To greeks, they *were* the bad guys. That's how "conquering" works. If you are the "conqueree" the "conquerer" is the bad guy. To other cultures, Xerxes was a hero - but this story is not from the perspective of one of those other cultures. I don't get how this is an insult? Is it not historical fact that persia tried to take over Greece?
Silly for people to get all offended over something like this. Its obvious the movie was based on a graphic novel - not real life. The novel was based on an ancient and famous battle. This is a Greek heroic story and it was undoubtedly a conscious choice on Miller's part to execute it in the same neo classical style used over a hundred years ago to portray Greek heroic events. This is actually "fitting" and quite brilliant from an artistic standpoint.
Most of the complaints I see - lack of clothes, abs, color correction, rascism - are made by people who have clearly never seen neo classical art, don't understand the concept of "influenced by", and cannot appreciate or understand what Miller did and how he did it. *All* these things are marks of a certain "style" for portraying Greek stories which was used 200 years ago - and what you see on the screen is a faithful reproduction of a graphic novel which used a lot of that style.
This movie IS a work of art. I appreciate it's origins and influence and am literally in awe of it. The only reason I didn't give it a 10 was because it's true, I didn't really care for the characters. I am not sure if thats wholly a flaw of the movie though...I might have been too busy picking my jaw up off the floor.