Just watched both films over the last two days piecemeal as work gets in the way.
One thing strikes me like a thunderbolt.
El Gibbos use of the Mayan language is cool and beans, however Apocalypto is an action film. It shows alot of promise in the opening chapter, the transistion to the city state, the wildly different culture. It does not however do anything with it.
It’s scenery that Jaguar Paw can escape from to rescue his wife. For all the grandiose production value, El Gibbo not does push the City State at all.
The executions are not explained much like all the other behaviour.
Why is the dialog in Mayan, it does not need to be.
If the characters had South American accents speaking English the effect would be the same.
300 - Now here is a film that shoud have been dubbed.
Is Leonidis Scottish? influenced by a few border towns with a little Irish thrown in?
He’s supposed to be Greek :smack:
I understand a producer wanting to make the Greeks sound alien to American ears but did they have to do it with such a hybrid anglicized accent.
What is wrong with them sounding a little bit … Greek?
Or better yet using the same accent consistently.
In short, Apocalyto should have been in English, 300 in Greek with Subtitles.
Personal rating: Apocalypto *** (of 5)
300 (**) … it was a sack of cack, poorly written, but very well made.