300 * out of ****

A homophobic, blood-loving, race-hating piece of Nazi propaganda

By this point, every man, woman, frat guy, dorm dweller, athlete, pothead, goofball, wordsmith, dancer, cook, dog-catcher, comic book collector, aspiring heart surgeon, sous chef, Greaser, Soc, sailor, sandman, action junkie and sneaky 13-year-old who really wanted to see "300" has seen it.

So there's no point in rehashing it or even specifically reviewing it. The movie, directed by Zack Snyder and employing a visual look inspired by Peter Jackson and graphic artist Frank Miller, is a phenomenon. Like "The Matrix" - which is far superior - it recalibrates Hollywood.

Sure, comic book movies have scored since the original "Superman." But "300" doesn't have a minted pedigree. No iconic heroes. And no titanic actors in it. The cloth from which it's cut might be absurd and remarkably unaware, but it's immensely attractive. Snyder and Co. splash every color of blood puddin' they could find on the screen, and the result, to me, is nothing less than right-wing propaganda. Maybe even Nazi propaganda. It's certainly Ayn Rand's wet dream.

Hyperbole? Nope. Just "300."

It opens on a piles of skulls beneath a cliff. A narrator tells us those are the miniature skulls of babies tossed to their death for any physical imperfection. Fortunately for baby Leonidas, who will one day be king of Sparta, he is without flaw, and is spared from murder. His physical perfection especially helps when he is trained to kill and thrown into the wilderness at 7. Later, when Leonidas leads his titular men against the giant Persian army in the name of freedom, we must remember the "liberty" for which he fights is really the tyranny of the pure. It's the Spartan, who embraces a beautiful death, against the defiled, deranged Persian, who toils as a slave. The leader of the Persian army is Xerxes, an eight-foot cross of Gandhi and belly dancer.

Most of his soldiers resemble Orcs. Some are magicians. A couple are deformed monsters At one point, frustrated, they simply use their lone rhinoceros against this band of sculpted, sepia-toned Greek gods. It's arrogant and faithless to presume audiences will set aside the substance of the Spartans -they're unlikable, smarmy, racist and homophobic and firmly reject the idea of diplomacy - to embrace the movie's dramatic images.

Breathtaking as they might be, they remain in celebration of something our conscience rejects. To demand the film remains in the vacuum of entertainment reduces the viewer to Alex in "A Clockwork Orange." And the final act of "300" feels like a cross between an MTV video and a high schooler's poorly penned allegory that he turns into the creative writing teacher after sealing the document with a tear of integrity, solemnly closed eyes and a symbolic kiss. It's total cheese and out of character with what we know of Leonidas throughout the movie.

It amounts to a beefcake weepie. Goofy, Harlequin-style idolatry. Of course it's absurd, but it doesn't mean it's not a little irresponsible when it eventually reduces every female character to a set of breasts and flowing locks. It doesn't mean we have to let it off the hook.

We may want to disassociate meaning from images, to turn them into a mechanical series of ones of zeroes, but we can't, and we don't, so embracing "300" for being cool is akin to embracing "Birth of a Nation" for its revolutionary filmmaking while it tacitly supported the Ku Klux Klan. Fanboys need to get a brain. Zack Snyder needs to get a clue.