300: Rise of an Empire
(2014)
300 didn’t particularly
impress me, aside from highlighting that Zack Snyder is a visual stylist of
some merit. One who desperately needs substance, and a guiding producer, to hold his
excesses in check and keep him from turning every scene into yet more “cool
shit”. However one milks it, 300 ends
up as an ode to the fascistic, revelling in the world it creates to such an
extent that it is never in danger of critiquing its Spartan heroes. It’s also infused with an uneasy homoeroticism
that expresses itself through rebuking anything weak or ugly or effeminate.
This prequel/parallelquel/sequel isn’t necessarily superior – whatever one
might say about 300, one wouldn’t be
able to deny its rigorous sense of identity – but 300: Rise of an Empire is certainly less overtly objectionable.
The negative side of Rise
of an Empire is that it goes through the motions of of its familiar themes,
which mostly come down to old favourites honour and strategic prowess. It’s a
rerun of 300, but with an army less
insanely addled in their virulent fervour. Honour in death is no longer
paramount, and this moderation results in a tempering of its predecessors more
extreme elements, even if there’s no stinting on the bloody abandon.
Noam Murro effectively apes Snyder’s style, and green screen
(there are some especially unlikely shafts of sunlight poking out all over the
place, and a dirty great moon hovering heaving into the sea) making this
cheerfully bloodthirsty and replete with now-retro speed ramping. There’s also
added 3D, a particularly annoyingly intrusive choice when watching it without
one of those dimensions.
But this prequel business has always been on to a loser. A
painfully hamfisted method of cashing in that no one was usually demanding, and
proved it by not showing up (Dumb and
Dumberer, Viva Rock Vegas). The
miracle is, Rise of an Empire works
as well as it does. Much of that is down Eva Green giving it some welly, and
the Persians (although she’s Greek) a face and motivation. She’s ever intense,
striking and superior, and her breasts are as impressively unyielding as we’ve
come to expect. At one point she even kisses a head she has just severed. She
also kicks ass with two swords.
On the downside, the heroic leader that is Themistokles is a
complete plank, which at least serves to give Butler some credit for what he brought
to the original. Aussie actor Sullivan Stapleton (who, it seems, Luc Besson
wants to turn into the next Stat; he’s no Stat!) barely registers, either in
terms of performance or looks. He could be almost anyone, and you probably won’t
recognise him next time he shows up in something. He can’t compete with Green,
and, crucially, we have difficulty believing all the glory talk about what an
amazing strategist he is.
This is a fundamental weakness, a more damaging one
than a screenplay that leaps about the place with scant regard for how it
affects narrative momentum (actually, this leaping about at least keeps the
attention, even if it fails to satisfy the dramatic whole). Additionally, when
it comes down to it, Sullivan is called upon to extol the same boring old crap
about dying a freeman rather than living a slave.
The main survivors of the original return, led by Lena
Headey as Queen Gorgo (not the 1961 monster movie). Headey is in particularly teeth-gritting
form, which is to say, incredibly wooden. This works okay for the narrated sequences,
but when she’s on screen she comes up short. There’s also David Whenham, back
without an eye and not filmed below the neck, presumably because it was too
much bother to grow back his abs (as far as I could discern). Andrew Tiernan
plays a slightly less hideous Ephialtes, and one who is offered a meagre
redemption that would have been unthinkable to tone of the original movie.
The interweaving storylines and time periods aren’t exactly
handled with panache or sleight of hand, but they do result in several
arresting sequences. We hear Gorgo describe the battle of Marathon, and, even
with the underwhelming Stapleton, the exploits of Themistokles are engrossing
(complete with made-up Persian presence). Later, the narrated story of
Artemsia, and the birth of god-Xerxes, are equally involving.
The claim to distinction of Rise of an Empire is sea
battles instead of infantry face-offs. If this doesn’t quite lead to a Master and Commander matching of wits,
it shouldn’t be a surprise, but neither is it without moments (the setting
alight of the ships is particularly strong), including an interlude where
Artemisia attempts to seduce Themistokles during a tête-à-tête (the look that passes between
two masked guards, on hearing the sounds from within the cabin, is one of the
few amusing moments on display here).
Jack O’Connell might be considered the Fassbender of this
pre/sequel, except that he’s already better known than the Fass was at that
point and this doesn’t actually do him any favours. He isn’t at his best
spouting earnest clichés, on the evidence of this, and should probably stick to
fare that gives him something meatier to bite into (Callan Mulvey, as his dad,
is more convincing).
Along the way, there are horses stepping on heads, heads
split in two, and too numerous dismemberments to be relayed. Junkie XL
furnishes some memorable aural beats, but seems obsessed with attaching himself
to mediocre movies (Paranoia was
another one he got his musical chops around).
Where does this leave the classical Greece at the movies? Its
history is mythologised and its myth is historicised. It’s a mixed up, muddled
up ancient world. Here there’s a man transformed into a demi-god and a genuine,
bona fide sea serpent. Take that Hercules!
Or was the latter just part of Themistokles’ nightmare? The Greek myths have
been cinematically disembowelled. Greek history has been six-packed up to its
eyeballs and left bereft of brains or subtleties. Someone should try making something
other than Frank Miller’s version.
