300 Americans versus Tehran
By Chad A. B. Wilson
Published March 17, 2007, 8:56 pm in Military / Foreign policy, Rhetoric.
I watched Zack Snyder's new film 300 this past weekend. I saw in Imax, too, which made it incredible. I know this isn't a column about movies, but sometimes I get lucky and I get to talk about my two favorite things at the same time. Yep, sometimes these blockbusters are also political allegories. And sometimes, but only sometimes, these political allegories are actually caught onto.
Fortunately, 300 is one of those movies. Time magazine quoted the spokesperson for Iran, who claims that 300 is outrageous because it is basically a movie about Iran's weakness. And believe it or not, he's not reading too much into it.
The Houston Press last week actually interpreted the film as a homosexual statement about the power of gayness. The Greeks, in their tanned, ashen, scantily clad bodies, prance around shoving pointy things into their fully clothed, faceless, mishapen enemies, knocking them down by the thousand. I think that interpretation, with all of its homosexual references may be a bit of a stretch. There's a limit to what we can read into a film. But then there are references that seem obvious in hindsight. In V for Vendetta, for example, there is a small sub-plot about a lesbian couple and the government crack down on homosexuality. This sub-plot is obviously about homosexuality and against government bias or persecution.
But then there are movies that take on new meanings based on when they are released. X-Men 2, for another example, was released just a couple weeks after the Iraq war started. It's no coincidence that it features a paramilitary organization that attempts to control the entire U.S. and bring down the government against a certain group--the mutants. Because the movie is released in March 2003, it becomes a parable of the Iraq war and organizations such as Haliburton that control the President.
300 is a similar movie. Even the plot betrays its political overtones. Sure, Snyder can hide behind the historical facts of the Persians versus the Greeks, but that doesn't change the fact that even history can be reinterpreted to represent current events. The Persians want to rule the entire world, and their leader, Xerxes, thinks of himself as a god, and everyone else thinks so, too.
Except the Greeks. And even among the Greeks, Sparta stands alone. It is a democracy, but it is ruled by a king, and it has the best military out of any nation in existence. It makes a defiant stand againt Xerxes with the help of another Greek nation, who really doesn't have much of a military and then abandons Sparta at the first sign of trouble. The Spartans, however, have made a stand against Persia with only 300 men, which is only a tiny portion of their overall army. Why wouldn't they bring their entire army? Because the country is a democracy and the council won't approve sending in the entire army. So the king is forced to go in with a small force led by the king. These fighting men are the best, though, so they put up a good fight, until, eventually, they perish. Meanwhile, the council is busy debating whether they should send in the entire army, and whether certain members have committed adultery, and whether others have committed treason.
So let me first say that I'm not willing to read this movie as a single allegory where every event and character represents one part of a single historical or political narrative. So I'm not going to say that the King represents George Bush. But there are easy ways to see portions of the plot as representing some events.
The Spartans, for example, are a militaristic nation where every male becomes a warrior. If the males are deformed in any way, they are discarded to the elements where they perish. The male fighters are then subjected to horrendous torture in an attempt to make them into fearless, perfect warriors. Nothing less is permitted. In some ways, the king rules absolutely, and he is the one who rejects diplomacy and makes enemies because of his rashness. He is also the one who is followed absolutely. He makes decisions quickly, even though the council is against him.
So even though I can't equate him with George Bush, the filmmaker knows that we can't read this stuff in isolation. He knows that the film is being viewed by millions of Americans, and the view of the president is not a coincidence. It can't be; it must be read as representative of current events. Even if people in twenty years watch this film (and I don't think they will), they probably won't read the characters and events as symbols of current events. But today, I think we have no choice.
Even the way the council prevents the president, I mean king, from committing the entire army to the cause is representative of the Iraq war, of the Democrats refusing to commit to Iraq. In some ways, 300 is one of the most conservative films I have seen. It praises militarism and condemns democracy in favor of decisive action. It hates women who attempt to enter politics because they can only negotiate with their sexuality. It denigrates the Persians as worshippers of a false god and who are really just his slaves. They try all kinds of dirty tricks to beat the 300 Spartans who oppose their army of millions, and they still can't beat them. The Spartans have their dirty tricks, too, but we don't mind because they're so outnumbered.
If we take a step back, and we forget about the possibilities of allegory, what this movie really tells us is that militarism is good and important. It is the protector of democracy, even though democracy doesn't support it. A strong military is the backbone of any good democracy; it must exist so that democracy can thrive. But democracy wants to destroy it, not realizing that the two need each other in order to thrive. Without democracy, the military is made of cowardly slaves. Without the military, the democracy will be taken over easily.
So 300 is inherently a political film with a political statement. Sure, it follows a comic book, but Snyder has also created a film that stand alone and represents our own current events. Watch it with an eye out for politics. But along the way, don't forget to actually enjoy it; I know I did.
Those Americans, I mean Spartans, they sure can fight.
And that's really the whole point.
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