Usually I don’t go into movies with the intention of analyzing them for male gender and sex roles. However, I went to see the movie [tag]300[/tag] today, and my brain simply clicked into "analytical" mode. I wish it hadn’t, because I would have enjoyed movie a lot more. The movie would entertain film studies students for hours trying to debate all the "issues" encapsulated by this film. There are all sorts of images of the idealized man, gender roles, patriotism. However, I don’t remember a move I’ve rolled my eyes more at than this one.

The first battle scene at Thermopylae featured the king of Sparta, King Leonidas, holding a spear at crotch level stabbing people in the waist. I thought to myself, "Damn, that’s awfully [tag]phallic[/tag]". Then he killed like four people with his crotch-spear…you know what…my brain just overloaded. There were thongs and spears and every single scene was some sort of assault on the senses. There are so many layers to the masculinity in this movie that the Spartan washboard abs simply scrub all coherent thoughts from your brain.

You’ve got monsters, action, and dialog always being shouted at people, not to people. The movie was very gory, very visceral, and really dumb. It’s a bloody violent comic book made into a movie. They accomplished what they wanted to do, which makes the film a success, but it wasn’t a "good movie". Once the adrenaline drains from your system and you have to think about the characters and plot, all that is left are the fights and action. It looks cool, but that’s about it for me.

It’s gory movie with a bunch of nearly naked guys running around killing each other. If that’s what you want to watch, you’ll love this movie. I felt nothing for any of the characters or themes presented in the movie. The glorification of the Spartan "ideal" isn’t compelling to me, which is why the movie failed to entertain. If that doesn’t bother you, or you like really gory action movies very loosely based on history, you’ll probably enjoy it.