Iranian official lashes out at Hollywood movie "300&quo

[Midnight Mike]

Iranian official lashes out at Hollywood movie "300" for insulting Persian civilization

An Iranian official on Sunday lashed out at the Hollywood movie "300" for insulting the Persian civilization, local Fars News Agency reported.

Javad Shamqadri, an art advisor to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, accused the new movie of being "part of a comprehensive U.S. psychological war aimed at Iranian culture", said the report.

Shamqadri was quoted as saying "following the Islamic Revolution in Iran, Hollywood and cultural authorities in the U.S. initiated studies to figure out how to attack Iranian culture," adding "certainly, the recent movie is a product of such studies."

The movie's effort wound be fruitless, because "values in Iranian culture and the Islamic Revolution are too strongly seated to be damaged by such plans", said the Iranin official.

Shamqadri, who is also a filmmaker, said that production of more domestic and artistic films which portray Iranian achievements is a proper response to movies like "300".

"300," an ancient epic about the famous Battle of Thermopylae in Greek history, set a new record at the box office in North America this weekend.

The Warner Bros. adaptation of the 480 B.C. battle took an estimated 70 million U.S. dollars in its debut weekend, according to figures released on Sunday by Los Angeles-based box office track firm Media by Numbers.

The R-rated film, based on comic book writer Frank Miller's graphic novel, tells the story that an army of 300 Spartan warriors led by their king Leonidas fought to the death to delay a massive Persian army's invasion, so that the Greeks could reorganize a counterattack.

[PhilDernerJr]

"..... Hollywood and cultural authorities in the U.S. initiated studies to figure out how to attack Iranian culture," adding "certainly, the recent movie is a product of such studies."

WHAT?! If anything, Hollywood is out to PROTECT Iranian interests and do what they can to make the traditionalists (who would be the ones pushing to invade Iran) look like the bad people!

Completely backwards.

[USAF Pilot 07]

Who cares?? It was still a great movie!

[Nycfly75]

There are some historical inaccuracies, but for God's sake its a movie, things tend to be dramaticized a bit more than in real life.

[Matt Molnar]

WHAT?! If anything, Hollywood is out to PROTECT Iranian interests and do what they can to make the traditionalists (who would be the ones pushing to invade Iran) look like the bad people!

Completely backwards.

After seeing the movie tonight I have to say this is one movie where Hollywood WASN'T afraid to show a particular middle eastern ethnic group at its worst. In fact I'm surprised ALL Muslims are not up in arms about the film, not just Iranians. The movie does not mention religion at all, but to me the entire movie was almost a perfect metaphor for the current battle between Western civilization and Muslim ideology, and I suspect it was intended that way.

The army of 300 Spartans = America, population: 280,000,000
The vast slave armies of tens of thousands of Persians = The entire Muslim faith, population: billions

Leonidas = George W. Bush
Xerces = Bin Laden or any other similar Muslim authority leading members of failed societies to their deaths

Theron = The Democratic Party
Humpback guy who betrays the Spartans = John Walker Lindh, Jose Padilla, any Al-Qaeda sympathizers/supporters/sleeper agents born here in America.

After getting slaughtered in hand to hand battle, the Persians begin to hang back and throw crude bombs and fire arrows at the Spartans, Leonidas calls them "cowards" = Head to head in legitimate battle, Muslim radical warriors have no chance against our military, so they instead fly planes into buildings and set off roadside bombs in Iraq.

The list goes on but I'm tired so I'll stop there.

No idea how historically accurate it is, but overall it was a very entertaining movie.