With more buffed bodies, six-packs and fake tan than Fitness First on a Thursday, 300 marches its way into cinemas like an army of Spartans. This is a tits-out telling of the legendary Battle of Thermopylae in more ways than ones. Under threat from Persia, King Leonidas takes a group of 300 warriors to defend Sparta from the invading hoards. His bold action causes a political rift at home, putting his Queen in an unenviable position with a royal rival. Out on the battlefield, Leonidas claims a thin gorge, the Hot Gates, which he believes will give him the home advantage. And it very nearly does.

300 is based on Frank Miller’s graphic novel, itself loosely based on legend. Yet historical reality has little value or purpose here for this is an exercise in male eroticism and pornographic violence. But what an exercise! Miller co-directed Sin City, based on another of his novels and a similar quality of hyper-design is invoked. Air-brushed to within an inch of their lives, actors storm the ancient stage with mountains of muscle (barely) clad in fetching leather. Allegedly fighting for freedom, theirs is a simple task: look good while the gore piles upon them. As battle begets battle against a digital backdrop of Arcadian romanticism, look good they do. Snyder has delivered a sumptuously textured work of art.

But looks aren’t everything. Threadbare script and corn-ball dialogue aside, the greatest victim in this war is a quiet truth. Revising the Persian army to a thuggish mass intent on sublimating the ‘noble’ Spartans sends a curious message in these troubled times. But maybe one shouldn’t look too deeply into this comic-book war. If you like your violence simple, and your men even simpler, 300 satisfies all desires.

// COLIN FRASER