Zack brought home a copy of 300 last week.  I had been interested in this movie since it opened but never had any intention of seeing it in a theater.

Loved it.  Loved it, loved it loveditlovedit.

It's hokey, over the top, melodramatic and obviously based on a comic book and I loved every frame of it.

It's the movie Gladiator wanted to be.

I'm the only person I know who didn't like Gladiator and I hated Gladiator, which is weird because usually I'm all over a blood and guts action adventure movie starring the likes of Russel McHunky Crow.  But that one was dull, stupid and gratuitous.  I even tried watching it again last year to see if I was maybe just in a foul mood the first time ( I often come to appreciate movies I didn't care for the first time, like You've Got Mail and Tequila Sunrise, which are two of my favorites now) but no, it was just as dull and stupid.

Ways in which 300 was better than Gladiator:

Better story.  Instead of a fictional character fighting a fictional tyrant in an historic setting, 300 was a fictionalized character who actually did something really cool.

Hotter star.  Sorry Russ but Gerry is off the charts.  He can Phantom my Opera any time he wants.

Better lines.  I can't think of a single quote from Gladiator and 300 is packed with great lines, many of which were lifted right from the original Greek source material.  Turns out those Spartans were the original quipsters.

A female character who actually IS  beautiful, clever and tougher than nails.  When Gorgo says goodby to her hubby, it's not with tears and sentimentality.  She says to him "Come back with your shield, or on it."  Later on in the movie she guts her nemesis like a fish.  Now that's a Spartan.

The point.  Gladiator pretended to be about freedom vs. tyranny but was really just an excuse to use bloody CGI affects.  300 really is about freedom vs. tyranny and has way better bloody CGI affects.

Frank Miller.  First SinCity then 300.  I'm a fan.

The way it looks.  My favorite thing about 300 is that the entire thing is shot to make it look as much like a movie painting (or pen and ink drawing) as possible.  All the effort was put into making it beautiful and operatic, not realistic and mundane.  Not only did this keep it true to the graphic novel, I mean comic book it was based on, but it put the modern movie goer into the mindset "these events were larger than life, this is not reality".  Gladiator tried to make the mayhem as real as possible, to make the modern audience feel the horror of the gladiator combat, while indulging in the same bloodlust that the ancient Roman spectators felt.  300 turns turns the carnage into a bloody ballet that really can't be taken seriously. 

The villains.  A treacherous hunchback.  A sleazy politician.  A nine foot god/king.  Several deformed and maniacal sub-human monsters.  Can't beat that with a stick.

I watched most of the special features disc, as well.  The first part had two historians discussing how much of the stuff in the movie was true to history. This was as interesting for me as the movie was.  Sparta was a fascinating place. 

Oh, and Gerard Butler can definitely be in my musical extravaganza.