Posted on Mon, Mar 5, 2007

‘300’ set to hit theaters

Daily Local

By Joseph McCabe

Director Zack Snyder’s new big-screen adaptation of Frank Miller’s graphic novel, tells the story of the 300 Spartan soldiers who fought countless Persians in the Battle of Thermopylae, a battle many believe laid the foundation for the world’s first democratic society. But like its source material, the film is unapologetic with the liberties it takes; depicting a world bigger, bolder, and far sexier than the one documented by history.

Snyder tells how he balanced the film’s realistic elements with its hyper-stylized flavor.

“Do you intellectualize all the violence and things?” he says. “You do a little bit. I think you can’t help it. But at the same time, do you just do what you think is cool? That’s the other thing you do do that. At some point you just say, ‘Gosh, it’d be cool to see a guy with arms that look like saw blades…’ And so that’s kind of where you net out a little bit. You can’t help it. Do I like the grotesque elements of it? I do. But it’s all just part of my aesthetic. I don’t consciously go, ‘Let’s make something freaky here.’ It just happens to be the way that I do it.”

“Does that make sense?” he adds with a laugh. We nod, though, truth be told, Snyder is more comfortable with images than words. He attended art school in Pasadena and studied visual art at Heatherlies School in London; and his strong visual sense eventually landed him music video and tv commercial gigs.

AdvertisementHis biggest break, however, came with 2004’s Dawn of the Dead remake, on which he made his feature-film directorial debut.

Snyder says that, ultimately, his approach to adapting Miller’s graphic novel was similar to Robert Rodriguez’s when he adapted the author’s Sin City follow the book as closely as possible, but allow room for improvisation.

“I guess it’s very similar. I mean, I guess the way I see it is that we ended up, because it’s a single story, we ended up trying to do whatever we could to make that story work. That happened to need, sometimes, to be fleshed out a little bit; and therefore need some more shots, some additional concepts and angles.”

“That’s really the most though other than that we kind of basically did the same thing. No one’s dissected that graphic novel more than I have. At least I don’t think. Maybe they have, maybe there’s some freaks that have.”

“I also drew heavily from the book,“ claims Gerard Butler, who plays the Spartan King Leonidas in 300. “Frank has created such an incredible world that you climb into. The style of character that he’s drawing out there I get it. I think I’m very good at picking out the essence, and intuiting the feel of the story. And I paid a lot of attention to that ‘What kind of world are we in? How does it feel? How do they look? How do they stand?’ And in fact, often, I studied their physicality, even just from the drawings. So there’s a whole bunch of different angles that you come from. I’m probably missing out about 90% of what I did because I’m always thinking about it. In fact, I drive myself nuts with it. But if you ask me afterwards, I’m like, ‘I… I don’t know…’”

We ask Butler if his experiences acting in other big-budget epics, like Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life and The Phantom of the Opera, prepared him for the acting challenges presented by 300’s many visual effects shots.

“I’ve got to be honest,” he says. “There’s a couple of ways to look at that yes and no. Yes because I honestly feel as an actor that I’m prepared for anything. I really have to focus on being very flexible, because the roles I play are extremely different. I end up either working on a glacier in the Icelandic sea in the middle of a hurricane, or dressed up as a phantom singing instead of speaking on a stage in Pinewood, or standing in front of a blue-screen wearing only a leather codpiece in Montreal. I’ve done such weird and wonderful roles and such weird and wonderful types and genres of film, that I try to focus on the positives, which is, ‘What is the completely new experience for me?’”

“There’s a lot of learning to be done with this type of acting. Is it my favorite type of acting? No. The film, I absolutely loved. I mean I think every single one of us, every crew member, all the actors, all the stunt guys, we knew we were making something pretty outstanding, and very, very different, and everybody was giving just a thousand percent effort. But in terms of acting in front of a blue-screen, definitely there’s a bit of a disconnect at times”

David Wenham, Butler’s co-star, agrees. Wenham plays Dilios, the soldier-storyteller whom Leonidas orders to leave the battle in order to inspire Sparta with tales of their army’s daring.

“We had very rigid instructions into what we could and couldn’t do,” says Wenham (who, having played Faramir in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings, is no stranger to visual-effects acting). “There were actually strict boundaries and frameworks. We knew the pictures Zack wanted to make, but we did have freedom within those pictures to give our input, and to follow our instincts as actors and to respond as we thought our characters, or our characters in the book, would’ve responded in particular circumstances. So, basically we’re all on the same page. Zack, the actors we’re all trying to collaborate to fulfill the one vision, if you like. We’re not all trying to be individuals. We’re all trying to be on the one page to be as faithful to Frank’s initial vision as possible.”

300

Starring: Gerard Butler, Vincent Regan, Lena Headey, David Wenham, Michael Fassbender, Tom Wisdom, Andrew Pleavin, Andrew Tiernan, Rodrigo Santoro

Director: Zack Snyder

Rating: R

Release Date: 03-09-07