I was a little surprised reading this. I figured, due to the lack of realism, the VDH would rip up one side of this and down the other. Instead, he sounds like he genuinely liked it. I think I'm genetically predisposed to like it, despite stuff that would normally make me feel a bit ill (the Hoplites are fighting without armor? Crap, that's like making Starship Troopers without the powered armor... oops). My Jacksonian upbringing just eats up stuff "Go Tell the Spartans, ye who passeth by, that here obediant to their laws we lie" or "You want our arms? Come take them."
I remember one of the characters in Zelazny's time travel book "Roadmarks" was always carrying a box of rifles in case he found the exit to Thermopylae where he intended to arm the Spartans. It's always been a theme. I'm more jazzed for the film knowing that VDH has given it a stamp of approval.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Victor Davis Hanson on 300
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
I heard about he movie at Crooked Timber with a typically liberal invective against Miller and Hanson.
http://crookedtimber.org/2006/10/05/when-boyhoods-fire-was-in-my-blood-i-read-of-ancient-freemen/
CT can be interesting at times but they are just the usual bore with this one. Just read the comments.
Damn, I guess, in addition to being overly emotional & penis-free, you need to have a gross misunderstanding of history to be a lib. For example, instead of seeing Thermopylae as the rear-guard action that bought Greece time to get it's army together, these guys saw "Well, but of course the REAL lesson of Thermopylae is something like: “No amount of heroic posturing can redeem tactical folly; don’t leave an unguarded pathway leading to the rear of your impregnable position.”
The Spartans lost." Hmmm. Am I wrong or were several thousand Thespans sent to guard the pass, but ran when the Persians showed up? So, unguarded, heroic posturting, or a thought out sacrifice of a few warriors to buy time for the many, hence the heroic aspects of the battle. And the delay allowed the army to form & win the battle of Salamis, not to mention putting a bit of fear in the Persians.
The other part that all these geniuses (cough, cough) keep coming up with is, "Oh, the Greeks weren't free, they had slaves and an empire," completely unable to see that the foundations of what they consider their oh so enlightened point of view came out of Greek philosophies, not Persian ones.
And then the ass complaining about the movie "Zulu" clearly not realizing what a pathetic "victory" it was since an entire column had been wiped out the day before at Islandlwana.
Fuck nuts.
Except that guy near the end named "trueliberal" who sets everyone else right, not that they noticed. I have to say, I don't live on the same planet as these guys.
Post a Comment