The WB held a 300 press conference in Second Life today with Zack Snyder, Frank Miller, Lena Headey, Rodrigo Santoro and, yes, dear, dear Gerard Butler. Was it weird? Of course it was! The participant avatars were pretty accurate — Miller in his perennial cowboy hat, Snyder in a baseball cap, Butler in his jeans and leather jacket. Headey was impressed with her new, large boobs, but in SL it’s impossible to have less than impressive knockers.
Miller mentioned that he had met with Robert Rodriguez last night about SIN CITY 2 and shooting might start as soon as June. As for casting “read all the rumors,” he hinted, perhaps a reference to their pursuit of Angelina Jolie for Ava in A DAME TO KILL FOR.
He also said that he has an actor in mind for THE SPIRIT but couldn’t reveal the name.
Snyder talked about getting ready for WATCHMEN. For now they are concentrating on the characters and the look of the costumes, since superhero movie fans are used to a high level of detail. “Spider-man is fetish in its detail. That’s the level people expect and if you fall short of it it becomes a joke and that’s the last thing I want to have happen.”
He said there would be some bonus footage on the 300 DVD: “It’s my cut, there is no director’s cut. But there was a sequence we cut out with these giant albino giants that had elfs riding on their backs. When I saw I said that’s too much. Even for me it’s too much! Vince Regan cuts the leg off one of the giants. Someone stabs the midget elf who is on the ground in an elf hat.”
Headey mentioned her recent pilot playing Sarah Conner in a proposed Terminator TV show, but said its been filmed and they are waiting to see if it gets picked up.
Santoro was asked about his LOST character and said you would be learning more about Paulo.
As for DDGB, he didn’t have much to say about the ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK remake he’s signed for. There’s a script but no director. He also said his favorite band is Sigur Ros. Sigh.
May I ask the round here something about that movie? I have just seen it and prior to watching it myself I was very cautious about the criticisms leveled against the film from the left or the right, or if Xerxes was portrayed as a poof or not. I own the book and thought it was a nice, if vastly overrated short story with little depth of interesting characters, primarily working as a showcase for Miller’s hyper-stylised art.
In other words: trash. Fun trash, yes, but trash nonetheless.
But now that I have watched the film, I noticed something: 300 is the best fascist film since “Triumph of the Will”, played on an almost Riefenstahlian canvas. Some of the shots are straight out of her “Olympia” film from 1936. ALL Greeks are in top shape and the shots of them fighting owe a LOT to Riefenstahl’s portrayal of the Aryan athletes in her Olympia film, down to the slow-motion and the shots from down below against the sky, all of them are shot in that loving Aryan light,
Gerald Butler’s performance reminds me a LOT of Hitler’s speeches, even with his “This! is! Sparta!” It is a mixture of barking and keeping a very rhythmic speech pattern introduced by Hitler. Take a look at old Hitler speeches. It is very much in line with his speech pattern.
The Persians are ALL monsters and black men. (you know, evil-looking black men). And a poof. It’s like Todd Browning’s “Freaks” on parade. There’s a Frankenstein monster, some ghouls with gray faces and apparently black blood, there’s a fat monster with its arms chopped off and replaced by scythes, there are amputee whores, both male and female… and Xerxes doesn’t know that blue eyeshadow on a man will always look tacky.
But the undercurrent of Riefenstahlian imagery is what disturbs me the most.
Perhaps, and I will concede this, it is because I am half-German and have been raised in both England and Germany and have studied the rise of fascism in my father’s country for years, but this disturbs me….
Oh dear… I won’t get into the supposed politics of “300.” I worn out. Ravished. Ravaged. No more…
But SIGUR ROS? *thud* I might have to drop my boyfriend for this man after all! We can listen to “Staralfur” and be soulful together. Hardy har har!
I’ve been talking about this here and here; not surprisingly, it’s not an angle that seems to be getting a lot of attention from the film’s backers. Which is NOT to imply that if you like the movie you are necessarily a fascist sympathizer, just that I have yet to see the argument successfully or even seriously rebutted anywhere. The uncritical acceptance of these ideas makes me really uncomfortable with our culture in general.
Being a Gerard (Gerry Butler) fan, I went to see 300 at the earliest date and time it showed here in Georgia.
What puzzles me, as does so many of Gerry fans, is that the press et al, can’t wrap their brains around WHY 300 is such a hit. IT’S GERRY….DUHHHH!!!!
I, and many females are not particular about this type of movie….all dark and gloomy, blood and guts, etc. etc…., but we WILL GO SEE GERRY every time this hunk decides to show his CHICK MAGNETIC FACE with TRACTOR BEAM EYES, on a SCREEN…big or small screen.
MORE GERRY PLEASE.
Thanks,
Angel
The custom avatars were made by myself and my Second Life business partner Damen Gorilla, owners of Second Life store adam n eve
How many of females buying tickets, texting, emailing, phoning, and shouting will it take for the press et al to figure out that GERARD BUTLER is the reason 300 is successful? We women have it figured out. It seems Warner Bros. has figured it out as well.
It is ALL ABOUT GERRY, guys.
Too bad there isn’t a gender breakdown on the $70+ million kickass boxoffice of last weekend. Maybe you boys will understand that women will pay a lot of money to see GERRY in anything.
Angel, I’m with you. MORE GERRY PLEASE!
Thank you Warner Bros. for figuring it out.
Cheers;
Michele R.
Cool. I’m so happy that thousands had a chance to experience the Silverscreen sim. Dannyboy Lightfoot and his team over at the Picture Production Company did an amazing job pulling together a major event like this, and I am very pleased they had the confidence in the V3 Group to build the Silverscreen sim and reform it for the Warner Brothers 300 Movie Junket. I think it really shows how useful Second Life can be in terms of distributing environments in a new way to an audience.
Thank you for providing this site and guest book.