# Spartan - The Movie

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spartan-the-movie/261661>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [August 26, 2004, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spartan-the-movie/261661 "2004-08-26T19:49:26Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Ass\_For\_A\_Hat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ec9cab/32.png) [@Ass\_For\_A\_Hat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ass_For_A_Hat)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2004, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spartan-the-movie/261661/1 "2004-08-26T19:49:26Z")

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I’m starting to get the feeling that I’m alone on this. Am I the only one that thought Spartan was a mediocre film?

I love Mamet. Glengarry Glen Ross is one of my favorite films. But Spartan felt like Mamet lite to me. Even more so than State and Main, which I enjoyed. I enjoyed the first half of the Spartan, but after the Derek Luke character got iced, I thought the film drifted. I can’t help but compare Spartan to The Spanish Prisoner. The second of half of Spartan fails to maintain any tension the way Spanish Prisoner did.

As always, William Macy and Ed O’Neill were great, but they had pretty small parts. IMHO Val Kilmer did not handle the Mamet dialog very well. And the Tia Texada charchater felt VERY tacked on to me.

Anyone want to set me straight?

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**Author:** ![Ass\_For\_A\_Hat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ec9cab/32.png) [@Ass\_For\_A\_Hat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ass_For_A_Hat)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2004, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spartan-the-movie/261661/2 "2004-08-28T02:08:11Z")

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Oh, come on. No one wants to defend this film? I’ve seen quite a few dopers put it on their ‘best movies of the year’ lists.

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**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2004, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spartan-the-movie/261661/3 "2004-08-28T12:54:31Z")

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I liked it. I don’t talk about it in complex terms. A movie is very goodgood or bad, defined as “I’ll see it again”, “I’m glad I went”, and “I regret paying 5$+ for it”.

It was solidly good. I had fun watching it, and presented a great story. It did lag a bit after the black guy bought it (OK, I saw it a while ago and the character names blur together).

One thing that did bother me was the way they decide who was in or out by telling the soldiers to go to town on each other. I have a hard time to believe the US military would do something that stupid.