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'300' og vestlig chauvinisme
Nej, jeg har ikke set "300", og der er også en pointe i, at jeg poster dette under "politik" og ikke under "film".
I stedet for selv at skrive en hel masse vil jeg nemlig give ordet til QuiQui fra den paklæstinensisk-amerikanske blog KabobFEST, der gør sig sine tanker om filmens mulige og umulige politiske kvaliteter og inherente budskaber - grundlæggende, som mange vil have bemærket i de politiske diskussioner om filmen, om de oplyste vesterlændinges (grækerne, læs: USA og dets allierede) heroiske kamp mod de væmmelige østerlændinge (læs: Arabere og iranere):
Before I continue with the serious problems I have with 300, allow me to admit that it is a visually stunning film. Almost every scene looks like it came out of an exceptionally drawn comic book.Men, hvis "300" virkelig er et sådant stykke politisk propaganda, der skal hjælpe med til at holde gejsten oppe i det efterhånden krigsplagede USA - virker den så? QuiQui mener nej, interessant nok:
Duh.
But, I do appreciate that. I can't say I came out of it wanting to kill someone, and I certainly didn't want to be Greek. (Seriously, Greek?) But yes, the cinematography was breathtakingly worth my time. In short, I recommend watching it -- but get yourself bootlegged copy. It's a moral imperative.
Miller would like us believe that anyone who wasn't Western in 480 BCE was abnormal, deformed and/or animal-like -- lobster-clawed; mindless turbaned drones; burn victims from the womb which rode atop massive rhinoceroses (rhinoceri?) -- don't forget about the rhinoceri.
Not unlike the rhinoceri they ride on today.
These monsters are the ancestors of those we -- Team America -- are "up against" in the Middle East right now -- "the sixth-century barbarism that these people actually represent."
After all, "the contention that all cultures are equal and that every belief system is as good as the next, is utterly reprehensible. We have to understand that some cultures are superior and some cultures are inferior. Our culture in the West is superior than their culture."
"Free" Greeks going up against barbaric Persians in the battle of Thermopylae should serve as a reminder that history is repeating itself today and we must back, not question, our fearless leader if (SPOILER ALERT:) the western civilization the Greeks sacrificed 299 Spartans for, is to be saved.
Yes, one survived. Even if he came home missing an eye.
Not unlike our troops today.
I was curious to watch 300 to see if I could re-prove (see: Sin City) to myself Frank Miller is an asshole. I'd been warned by equally insufferable graduate students who, for fun, can critically analyze an ice cream scoop by using the words "Foucauldian," "discourses," "panoptic," "essentialize," "constructionist," "gaze," "hegemony," "poststructural" and "postcolonial" all in the same breath, who, after watching Miller's latest installation came back reporting that the movie 300 proves beyond a reasonable doubt that Frank Miller really is an asshole.
I suppose that in order to catch the connection one would have to step away from 300's hypnotic cinematography that has you rewinding each time to say, "Fuuuuuckk.... that shit was awwwwwwwesome!" and first question why a film would want to depict all Greeks as humans while depicting almost every Persian as deformed and animal-like.
Of course, in order for anyone to believe this might be untrue, one would first have to believe that Persians in 480 BCE were actually of the human species. I think it's safe to say that they were. Their descendants, who don't have lobster-like qualities, are still around today and are actually quite hott. I get mistaken for one all of the time at airport security checks.
We call them "Iranians." And a rose by any other name would look just as hott.
Frank Miller's latest installation seethes as an orientalist allegory for the U.S.'s wars in the Middle East -- a blatant propaganda tool to raise support for yet another war, perhaps this time with Iran.Og det må man jo så trøste sig med.
But to think that the average viewer is really taking all that away from this movie would be giving Americans too much credit. We're just not that bright, Frank.
We're just not that bright.
Link til hele indlægget.