HAPPY NOROOZ!

[Frankie]

Fariba and I send you all best wishes on this happy ancient day. May the coming year of the Persian calendar be filled with love, peace, health and prosperity for all.
:toast: :toast:

[Donger]

Send money or we no send nuclear fuel.

[big nasty kcnut]

HAPPY NOROOZ to you Fariba and Frankie.

[vailpass]

Have you seen the movie 300 Frankie?

[Frankie]

Have you seen the movie 300 Frankie?
Not yet. I usually catch the movies I wanna see a few weeks later at the nice Dollar theaters near my house. Call me cheap, but they are pretty nice theaters.

[vailpass]

Not yet. I usually catch the movies I wanna see a few weeks later at the nice Dollar theaters near my house. Call me cheap, but they are pretty nice theaters.

LMAO I'm the same way, a matinee guy all the way.
I asked because I recently read an article (maybe in the Washington Post ??) entitled "300 vs. 70 million" with the 70 mil. being the population of Iran.

The author of this well written article was an Iranian woman whose main point was that the movie 300 had all of Iran up in arms. According to her the vast majority of Iranians took offense at the portrayal of Persians in the movie and felt it was a deliberate swipe at Iran. Apparently it made the headlines in the major newspapers, was the topic of talk radio, and was the buzz on the street.
She even went so far as to say the timing of the release deliberately coincided with the Iranian holy week.

Are you aware of this controversy? My overall reaction is to say "relax people, it's just a movie and movies are pretend. We get slighted in movies all the time but we don't take it seriously".
What is your take on this?

*edit* article pasted below:

Tuesday, Mar. 13, 2007
300 Sparks an Outcry in IranBy Azadeh Moaveni/Tehran
All of Tehran was outraged. Everywhere I went yesterday, the talk vibrated with indignation over the film 300 — a movie no one in Iran has seen but everyone seems to know about since it became a major box office surprise in the U.S. As I stood in line for a full hour to buy ajeel, a mixture of dried fruits and nuts traditional to the start of Persian new year festivities, I felt the entire queue, composed of housewives with pet dogs, teenagers, and clerks from a nearby ministry, shake with fury. I hadn't even heard of the film until that morning when a screed about it came on the radio, so I was able to nod darkly with the rest of the shoppers, savoring a moment of public accord so rare in Tehran. Everywhere else I went, from the dentist to the flower shop, Iranians buzzed with resentment at the film's depictions of Persians, adamant that the movie was secretly funded by the U.S. government to prepare Americans for going to war against Iran. "Otherwise why now, if not to turn their people against us?" demanded an elderly lady buying tuberoses. "Yes, truly it is a grave offense," I said, shaking my own bunch of irises.

I returned home to discover my family in a similar state of pique. My sister-in-law sat behind her laptop, sending off an e-mail petition against the film to half of Tehran, while my husband leafed through a book on the Achaemenid Empire, noting that Herodotus had estimated the Persian army at 120,000 men, not one million as the film claimed. The morning newspaper lay on the table with the headline "300 AGAINST 70 MILLION!" (the population of the country). It was echoed by the evening news: "Hollywood has opened a new front in the war against Iran."

The timing of the computer-generated film, which depicts the ancient confrontation of Sparta and the Persian empire at the Battle of Thermopylae, is certainly inauspicious. It falls on the eve of Norouz, Persian new year, a time when Iranians typically gather in proud celebration, observing rites that date back over 3,000 years, way before Islam, to the age of Zoroastrianism, when their ancient land produced the world's first monotheistic religion. It is not a particularly welcome season to be portrayed as pillaging, deranged savages. Since the entire country will be on two weeks of official holiday, there will be no shortage of time to sit about discussing the slight and what it portends for Iran's current confrontation with the United States. For a people prone to conspiracy logic, the box office success of 300, compared with the relative flop of Alexander (another spurious period epic dealing with Persians) is cause for considerable alarm, signaling ominous U.S. intentions.

While the hullabaloo over 300 may dampen Iranians' holiday spirits, it offers common cause between people and their estranged government. Top officials and parliament have scorned the film as though it were a matter of state, and for the first time in a long while, taxi drivers are shaking their fists in agreement when the state news comes on. Agreeing that 300 is egregious drivel is fairly easy. I'm relatively mellow as Iranian nationalists go, and even I found myself applauding when the government spokesman described the film as fabrication and insult. Iranians view the Achaemenid empire as a particularly noble page in their history and cannot understand why it has been singled out for such shoddy cinematic treatment, as the populace here perceives it, with the Persians in rags and its Great King practically naked. The Achaemenid kings, who built their majestic capital at Persepolis, were exceptionally munificent for their time. They wrote the world's earliest recorded human rights declaration, and were opposed to slavery. Cuneiform plates show that Persepolis was built by paid staff rather than slaves And any Iranian child who has visited Persepolis can tell you that its preserved reliefs depict court dress of velvet robes, and that if anyone was wearing rags around 500 B.C., it wasn't the Persians.

It is going to take an act of foolhardy courage to distribute that film in Iran. It will truly be 70 million against 300.

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1598886,00.html

[Chief Chief]

Go to www.hallmark.com today and e-mail a free Happy Norooz holiday card to someone you love.

[Frankie]

LMAO I'm the same way, a matinee guy all the way.
I asked because I recently read an article (maybe in the Washington Post ??) entitled "300 vs. 70 million" with the 70 mil. being the population of Iran.

The author of this well written article was an Iranian woman whose main point was that the movie 300 had all of Iran up in arms. According to her the vast majority of Iranians took offense at the portrayal of Persians in the movie and felt it was a deliberate swipe at Iran. Apparently it made the headlines in the major newspapers, was the topic of talk radio, and was the buzz on the street.
She even went so far as to say the timing of the release deliberately coincided with the Iranian holy week.

Are you aware of this controversy? My overall reaction is to say "relax people, it's just a movie and movies are pretend. We get slighted in movies all the time but we don't take it seriously".
What is your take on this?

*edit* article pasted below:

Tuesday, Mar. 13, 2007
300 Sparks an Outcry in IranBy Azadeh Moaveni/Tehran
All of Tehran was outraged. Everywhere I went yesterday, the talk vibrated with indignation over the film 300 — a movie no one in Iran has seen but everyone seems to know about since it became a major box office surprise in the U.S. As I stood in line for a full hour to buy ajeel, a mixture of dried fruits and nuts traditional to the start of Persian new year festivities, I felt the entire queue, composed of housewives with pet dogs, teenagers, and clerks from a nearby ministry, shake with fury. I hadn't even heard of the film until that morning when a screed about it came on the radio, so I was able to nod darkly with the rest of the shoppers, savoring a moment of public accord so rare in Tehran. Everywhere else I went, from the dentist to the flower shop, Iranians buzzed with resentment at the film's depictions of Persians, adamant that the movie was secretly funded by the U.S. government to prepare Americans for going to war against Iran. "Otherwise why now, if not to turn their people against us?" demanded an elderly lady buying tuberoses. "Yes, truly it is a grave offense," I said, shaking my own bunch of irises.

I returned home to discover my family in a similar state of pique. My sister-in-law sat behind her laptop, sending off an e-mail petition against the film to half of Tehran, while my husband leafed through a book on the Achaemenid Empire, noting that Herodotus had estimated the Persian army at 120,000 men, not one million as the film claimed. The morning newspaper lay on the table with the headline "300 AGAINST 70 MILLION!" (the population of the country). It was echoed by the evening news: "Hollywood has opened a new front in the war against Iran."

The timing of the computer-generated film, which depicts the ancient confrontation of Sparta and the Persian empire at the Battle of Thermopylae, is certainly inauspicious. It falls on the eve of Norouz, Persian new year, a time when Iranians typically gather in proud celebration, observing rites that date back over 3,000 years, way before Islam, to the age of Zoroastrianism, when their ancient land produced the world's first monotheistic religion. It is not a particularly welcome season to be portrayed as pillaging, deranged savages. Since the entire country will be on two weeks of official holiday, there will be no shortage of time to sit about discussing the slight and what it portends for Iran's current confrontation with the United States. For a people prone to conspiracy logic, the box office success of 300, compared with the relative flop of Alexander (another spurious period epic dealing with Persians) is cause for considerable alarm, signaling ominous U.S. intentions.

While the hullabaloo over 300 may dampen Iranians' holiday spirits, it offers common cause between people and their estranged government. Top officials and parliament have scorned the film as though it were a matter of state, and for the first time in a long while, taxi drivers are shaking their fists in agreement when the state news comes on. Agreeing that 300 is egregious drivel is fairly easy. I'm relatively mellow as Iranian nationalists go, and even I found myself applauding when the government spokesman described the film as fabrication and insult. Iranians view the Achaemenid empire as a particularly noble page in their history and cannot understand why it has been singled out for such shoddy cinematic treatment, as the populace here perceives it, with the Persians in rags and its Great King practically naked. The Achaemenid kings, who built their majestic capital at Persepolis, were exceptionally munificent for their time. They wrote the world's earliest recorded human rights declaration, and were opposed to slavery. Cuneiform plates show that Persepolis was built by paid staff rather than slaves And any Iranian child who has visited Persepolis can tell you that its preserved reliefs depict court dress of velvet robes, and that if anyone was wearing rags around 500 B.C., it wasn't the Persians.

It is going to take an act of foolhardy courage to distribute that film in Iran. It will truly be 70 million against 300.

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1598886,00.html

Bah, it's clearly a comic book. So the protagonists are exaggerated heroes and the 'enemy' are exaggerated baddies. Doesn't bother me. I think the policies of the current Iranian leadership are far more damaging to the Persian idetity and image than someone's unscientific interpretation of the Greek Alamo. I'm definitely gonna see it.

(BTW, Norooz is an ancient Persian tradition, not a "holy" event.)

[Frankie]

Go to www.hallmark.com today and e-mail a free Happy Norooz holiday card to someone you love.
I took the bait and checked. It's unfortunate that they don't cover Norooz. They have cards for every other freaking event! :cuss:

[vailpass]

Bah, it's clearly a comic book. So the protagonists are exaggerated heroes and the 'enemy' are exaggerated baddies. Doesn't bother me. I think the policies of the current Iranian leadership are far more damaging to the Persian idetity and image than someone's unscientific interpretation of the Greek Alamo. I'm definitely gonna see it.

(BTW, Norooz is an ancient Persian tradition, not a "holy" event.)

Thanks for the clarification. It seemed from the article that it is somehow related to the Persian new year?

[Rooster]

Happy Norooz to you too Frankie.



Check your PM. :)

[go bo]

happy norooz to you frankie and to all the people you love...

i hope you have a truly good time...

[Extra Point]

I take it you won't be going here to celebrate (pic ref. by Ultra Peanut), but happy Norooz, just the same: