Posting by numbers (or, 300 in 300)

300 words about the 2007 Hollywood film 300, which was based on Frank Miller’s graphic novel 300. His inspiration came from viewing the 1962 film The 300 Spartans: “[it] changed the course of my creative life”.

480bc: King Leonidas leads a force of 300 muscle-bound men to fight the Persians at Thermopylae.

There’s a feast of near-naked buffed-up men to see, but opinion is split over whether the film is pro- or anti-gay.

Table of Malcontents cites “10 Reasons Why ‘300’ is gay”, including close-up scenes of men stroking their weapons, and the only straight character being a deformed, insane creature who betrays the Spartans just to have sex with some female slaves!

An OUTzone reviewer (300: Gay or Homophobic) was offended by it:

It looks homoerotic, but it’s actually kinda homophobic. The movie makes careful distinctions about which Greeks are gay (the Athenians, not the Spartans, at least not in this flick). The head villain, Xerxes, looks like a drag queen missing a wig. And here’s the part my boyfriend and I walked out laughing about. Every time the hairless chiseled muscle-bound dudes start to wrestle, there's usually a sex scene with lots of boobies right after. Let’s be clear – it’s a movie marketed to male college freshman [sic]. And, it turns out – straight male college freshman [sic]. Which is fine. It’s just the overt exclusion that gets us.

And the Guardian’s Michael White says: “300 is a dangerous piece of fantasy”.

There’s a lot of chatter about this film on the Internet, as a quick Google search will prove, but, whatever your views, is 300’s number up? Is 12 the new 300? One blog, 300 blogs about Frank Miller’s ‘300’, seems to suggest it could be. It ran out of things to say after a mere dozen entries!