Go see "300"

I've decided that modern cinema isn't a total waste after all.

Things have gotten so high tech with movies nowadays, that I find very little reaches out and grabs me cinematically. I mean, CGI is used for EVERYTHING, and the whole point was to make epic movies with an exceedingly realistic quality. The monsters look real. The scenery looks real. The talking animals look real. Everything has become so realistic that it has become rather boring.

So that's why I gravitate to what I call ExtraRealistic films. One might even say Hyperrealistic-- but I like the first term better. Like Extraterrestrial. or Extraordinary. Films like the recent Pan's Labyrinth. Or Sin City. Or Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. All films that are visually set apart from our run of the mill action/epics.

Sure there are monsters and bizarre mancreatures in "300" and they seem realistic. And yes there are some campy moments. But there is this stretch and texture to the film that makes it all more fantastical. More bizarre. More shockingly beautiful.

Not to mention the absolute parade of manflesh in the movie! But really the movie is more than that.

The movie on a whole is visually stunning. It has beautiful cinematography-- even if the use of wheat fields is SO Gladiator. But the grainy, gritty texture and smoky atmospheres are brilliant. And then there is the gratuitous use of slow motion and what I like to call "the Graphic Arts Effects". The use of extreme camera angles, closeups, odd points of view, etc all give it the look and feel of a graphic novel.

And I LOVE that!

I can't type any more without giving any spoilers or anything more about the film. Just go see it.

P.S. Stay for the closing credits. They are beautiful.