300 [2007]

Spartans, Prepare For Glory!

When the boy was born, like all spartans, he was inspected.

If he'd been small or puny or sickly or misshapen, he would have been discarded.

From the time he could stand, he was baptized in the fire of combat.

Taught never to retreat, never to surrender.

Taught that death on the battlefield in sevice to Sparta was the greatest glory he could achieve in his life.

At age 7, as is customary in Sparta, the boy was taken from his mother and plunged into a world of violance.

Manufactured by 300 years of Spartan warrior society to create the finest soldiers the world has ever known.

The agoge, as it's called, forces the boy to fight.

Starves them, forces them to steal, and if necessary, to kill.

By rod and lash the boy was punished, taught to show no pain, no mercy.

Constantly tested, tossed into the wild.

Left to pit his wits and will against nature's fury.

It was his initiation, his time in the wild, for he would return to his people a Spartan or not at all.

The wolf begins to circle the boy.

Claws of black steel, fur as dark knight, eyes glowing red, jewels from the pit of hell itself.

The giant wolf sniffing, savoring the scentof the meal to come. 

It's not the fear that grips him, only a heightened sense of things.

The cold air in his lungs.

Windswepts pines moving against the coming night.

His hands are steady.

His form, perfect.

And so the boy, given up for dead, returns to his people, to sacred Sparta, a king!

Our king, Leonidas!

It's been more than 30 years since the wolf and winter cold.

And now, as then,  a beast approaches.

Patient and confident, savoring the meal to come.

But this beast is made of men and horses, swords and spears.

An army of slaves, vast beyond imagining, ready to devour tiny Greece, ready to snuff out the world's one hope for reason and justice.

A beast approaches, and it was King Leonidas himself who provoked it.

~Dilios

My father taught me that fear is always a constant.

But accepting it, make you stronger.

In the end, a Spartan's true strength is the warrior next to him.

So give respect and honor to him, at it will be returned to you.

~King Leonidas, to his son

King Leonidas: Now, what message do you bring?

The Messenger: Earth and water.

King Leonidas: You rode all the way from Persia for earth and water?

[The Messenger nodded]

Queen Gorgo: Do not be coy or stupid, Persian. 

You can afford neither in Sparta.

The Messenger: What makes this woman think she can speak among men?

Queen Gorgo: Because only Spartan women have birth to real man.

 

The Messenger: Choose your next words carefully, Leonidas, they may be your last as king.

King Leonidas: "Earth and water"

[draw his sword to The Messenger]

The Messenger: Madman... You're a madman!

King Leonidas: Earth and water...

You'll find plenty of both down there.

The Messenger: No man, Persian or Greek, no man threatens a messenger.

King Leonidas: You bring the crowns and heads of conquered kings to my city steps.

You insult my queen.

You threaten my people with slavery and death.

Oh, I've chosen my words carefully, Persian.

Perhaps you should have done the same.

The Messenger: This is blasphemy! This is madness!

[King Leonidas down his sword and look at his queen. Queen Gorgo nodded]

King Leonidas: Madnesses? THIS IS SPARTA!!!

[he kicks The Messenger down to the well]

The Ephors, priests to the old gods.

Inbred swine.

More creature than man.

Creatures whom even Leonidas must bribe and beg.

For no Spartan King has gone to war without The Ephor's blessing.

~Dilios

The Ephors choose only the most beautiful Spartan girl to live among them as Oracles.

Their beauty is their curse, for the old wretches have the needs of men and souls as black as hell.

~Dilios

Pray to the winds, Sparta will fall.

All Greece will fall.

Trust not in men, honor the Gods, honor The Carneia.

~The Oracle

We march, for our lands, for our families, for our freedoms.

We march.

~Dilios

King Leonidas: SPARTANS!!! 

What is your profession?

Spartans: WAR! WAR! WAR!

King Leonidas, to Daxos: You see, old friend, I brought more soldiers than you did.

I beg you, bold king, to permit me to redeem my father's name by serving you in combat.

My father trained me to feel no fear, to make spear and shield and sword as much a part of me as my own beating heart.

I will earn my father's armor, noble king, by serving you in the battle.

~Ephialtes

King Leonidas: Raise your shield.

Ephialtes: Sire?

King Leonidas: Raise your shield as high as you can.

[Ephialtes got trouble while lifting his shield]

King Leonidas: Your father should have taught you how our phalanx works.

We fight as a single, impenetrable unit.

That is the source of our strength.

Each Spartan protects the man to his left from thigh to neck with his shield.

A single weak spot and the phalanx shatters.

From thigh to neck, Ephialtes.

I am sorry, my friend, but not all of us were made to be soldiers.

Ephialtes: But I...

King Leonidas: If you want to help in Spartan victory...

Ephialtes: Yes...

King Leonidas: Clear the battlefield of the dead, tend the wounded, bring them water...

But as for the fight itself... I cannot use you.

This is where we hold them.

This is where we fight!

This is where they die!

Remember this day, men... for it will be yours for all time.

~King Leonidas

Give them nothing, but take from them everything.

~King Leonidas

King Leonidas: You have many slaves, Xerxes, but few warriors.

It won't be long before they fear my spears more than your whips.

Xerxes: It's not the lash they fear... 

It's my divine power!

There will be no glory in your sacrifice.

I will erase even the memory of Sparta from the histories.

Every piece of Greek parchment shall be burned.

Every Greek historian and every scribe shall have their eyes put out and tongues cut from their mouths.

Why... uttering the very name of Sparta and Leonidas will be punishable by death.

The world will never know you existed at all.

~Xerxes

The world will know that free men stood against a tyrant.

That few stood against many.

And before this battle was over, that even a god-king can bleed.

~King Leonidas

They have served the dark will of Persians Kings for 500 years.

Eyes as dark as night.

Teeth filed to fangs.

Soulless.

The personal guard to King Xerxes himself.

The Persian warrior elite.

The deadliest fighting force in all of Asia: The Immortals.

~Dilios

The battle is over when I say it's over!

~King Leonidas

Spartans never retreat, Spartans never surrender.

~King Leonidas

I have lived my entire life without regret until now.

It's not that my son gave up his life for his country.

It's just that I never told him that I loved him the most.

The he stood by me with honor.

That he was all that was best in me.

~Captain

Dilios: But sire, I am fit and ready for battle.

King Leonidas: That you are, one of the finest.

But you have another talent unlike any other Spartan.

You will deliver my final orders to the council with force and verve.

Tell them our story.

Make every Greek know what happened here.

You'll have a grand tale to tell, a tale of victory.

Dilios: Victory... Yes, my lord.

Sire, any message...?

King Leonidas: For the queen? [he took off the necklace] 

None that need be spoken.

Councilmen... I stand before you not only as your queen.

I come to you as a mother.

I come to you as a wife.

I come to you as a Spartan woman.

I come to you with great humility.

I'm not here to represent Leonidas.

His actions speak louder than my words ever could.

I'm here for all those voices which vannot be heard.

Mothers, daughters, fathers, sons... three hundred families that bleed for our rights and for the very principles this room was built upon.

We're at war, gentlemen.

We must send the entire Spartan army to aid our king in the preservation of not just ourselves, but of our children.

Send the army for the preservation of liberty.

Send it for justice.

Send it for law and order.

Send it for reason.

But most importantly, send our army for hope.

Hope that a king and his men have not been wasted to the pages of history.

That their courage bonds us together.

That we are.

Made stronger by their actions and that your choices today reflect their bravery.

~Queen Gorgo

Theron: This chamber needs no history lesson, my queen.

Queen Gorgo: Then what is the lesson you would like to have?

Shall I begin to enumaete all of them?

Honor... Duty... Glory...

Theron: You speak of honor, duty and glory?

But what of adultery?

Loyalist: How dare you!

Theron: How dare I?

Watch her carefully.

She is a trickster in true form.

Do not play with the members of this sacred chamber, my queen.

Just hours ago, you offered yourself to me.

Were I a weaker man, I would have her scent on me still.

Loyalist: This is outrage!

Theron: Oh, the hypocrite speaks! 

Did you not receive a similar payment, which you took in exchange for her having an audience with these noble men?

Queen Gorgo: That is a lie!

Theron: Is it?

Was he not, by your invitation, asked to come to the king's bedchamber?

The very bed where you attempted to negotiate with me so vigorously?

You look shocked.

A bribe of the flesh, gentlemen, while her husband promotes anarchy and war.

Words escape even the most cunning tongue, my little whore queen.

Theron, to the guards: Remove her from this chamber before she infects us further with her inglorious and shabby self.

[Queen Gorgo grabs one of the guard's sword and stick it to Theron]

Queen Gorgo: This will not be over quickly.

You will not enjoy this.

I am not your queen!

[Theron fall with the coins from Xerxes scattered on the floor]

Despite your several insults, despite your horrid blasphemies, the lord of hosts is prepared to forgive all, and more, to reward your service.

You fight for your lands, keep them.

You fight for Sparta, she will be wealthier and more powerful than ever before.

You fight for your kingship, you will be proclaimed warlord of all Greece, answerable only to the one true master of the world.

Leonidas, your victory will be complete if you but lay down your arms and kneel to The Holy Xerxes.

~Persian General

It's been more than 30 years since the wolf and the winter cold.

And now as then, it's not fear that grips him, only restlessness.

A heightened sense of things.

The seaborne breeze cooly kissing the sweat at his chest and neck.

Gulls cawing... complaining even as they feast on the thousands of floating dead.

The steady breathing of the 300 at his back.

Ready to die for him without a moment's pause.

Every one of them reasy to die.

~Dilios

You there, Ephialtes... Mau you live forever.

~King Leonidas

His helmet is stifling, it narrowed his vision and he must see far.

His shield was heavy, it threw him off balance and his target is far away.

[Leonidas throws his spear and hits the side of Xerxes' face, ripping off his face piercings] 

The old ones say we spartans are descended from Hercules himself.

Bold Leonidas gives testament to our bloodline.

His roar is long and loud.

~Dilios

Stelios, hit by arrows: My king... it's an honor to die at your side.

King Leonidas: It's an honor to have lived at yours.

Should any free soul come across that place in all the countless centuries yet to be, may all our voices whisper to you from the ageless stones.

Go tell Spartans, passerby, that here, by Spartan law, we lie.

And so my king died, barely a year ago.

Long I pondered my king's cryptic talk of victory.

Time has proven him wise.

For from free Greek to free Greek the word was spread that bold Leonidas and his 300 so far from home liad doen their lives not just for Sparta but all for Greece and the promose this country holds.

Now here on this rugged patch of earth called Plataea, Xerxes' hordes face obliteration!

Just there the barbarians huddle, sheer terror gripping tight their hearts with icy fingers, knowing full well what merciless horrors they suffered at the swords and spears of 300.

Yet they stare now across the plain at 10,000 Spartans, commanding 30,000 free Greeks.

The enemy outnumber us a paltry three to one.

Good odds for any Greek.

This day we rescue a world from mysticism and tyranny and usher in a fiture brighter than anything we can imagine.

Give thanks, men, to Leonidas and the brave 300.

TO VICTORY!!!

~Dilios

*****