300 : La Naissance d'un empire

A feast in so many ways! Unbelievably clear, brilliant photography. Very graphic, but never ceases to amaze. The film is ultimately not as exciting or entertaining as its predecessor, but nevertheless still fascinating. Plot flaws galore, it doesn't quite made sense why Themistokles went to Artemisia's ship, as it seemed like a suicide mission, but the sex scene that subsequently followed was indeed one to behold!

The film does become a bit repetitive and the slow motion overdone, but the eye candy more than compensates for this! Sullivan Stapleton makes a likable hero.

I can't understand why Zack Snyder didn't direct this sequel, and how someone who has never directed an action sequence before and just one feature film can be entrusted with a production of this magnitude. That would already be a recipe for disaster, even though in reality Snyder was supervising.

In an attempt to live up to it's predecessor, 300: Rise of An Empire is action-packed, presents impressive visuals and is very bloody. In fact there is more action, more blood, and more nudity than in the original 300. As for the plot, there really isn't much to chew on. A naval commander, Themistocles is supposedly trying to reunite Greece. Since the story takes place before, during and after King Leonidas leads his men to fight the Persians, it can be hard to follow at times.

Most of the acting was mediocre and couldn't quite compensate for the weaknesses in the story. The Australian actor cast as Themistocles in my opinion was a very bad choice, and comes nowhere close to what Gerard Butler did as King Leonidas in 300. He just doesn't bring that rugged heroic presence on screen as is expected. Interestingly I read somewhere that director Noam Murro insisted it would be Sullivan Stapleton who played this character, claiming he was 'the one'. Eva Green on the other hand is plays an excellent villain as Artemisia.

How the hell did the producers manage to take a superb movie and savagely sodomize it with this emetic sequel.. Bloody hell.

Is it a 300 prequel, sequel, or set concurrently with the events of 300? Yes. It somehow manages to be all of the above, and manages to come up with a story that leads up to the events of the original and sorta what happens afterwards as well as creating a storyline of what was happening at the same time somewhere else. It's also always fun when original actors return in cameos to reprise their roles to give further character backstory especially the "this is madness!" guy who manages to get a quick story arc.

Ancient Greece is in peril . . again. This calls for much chest-beating, shouting and cgi blood all over the place.

The sea is the battle arena for this entertaining follow-on to '300', a rant-infested Gerard Butler bloodbath from a few years ago. It's pretty much non-stop grunting, gesticulating and gore for it's entirety, which is quite pleasing.

Of course, most of the rating is for the dual fabulousness of Eva Green and Lena Headey, both having an over-the-top fem-ball amongst the testo-carnage. It was disappointing they didn't settle their differences via a bare-breasted cat-fight, but you can't have everything.