"I was surrounded by hundreds of stuntmen, who were amazing. Stuntmen are my favourite people on a film set, but I had this thing that really helped me get through, which was this thought in my head that, ‘If I can train in such a way that they’re actually going, “He is a badass…” – because I know stuntmen and they like actors but mostly they see them as wet blankets. [I wanted] to train in a way so they would actually take their hats off to me, and in a way so that you would believe that they would actually follow you. I was [working out] six hours a day: two hours with them, two hours doing the 300 work-out, two hours with my own bodybuilder… pumping 25 times before each take. But I was also surrounded by a lot of guys putting in a lot of effort. It was great having that unity of purpose both as an army and in terms of what we were trying to make in this movie and in terms of fitness, training and that warrior spirit. It was a very powerful place to be."

"The Persian side, on the other hand, the opposite. We see the emperor Xerxes as a 9-foot dandy with a seductive foghorn for a voice and a face full of jangling piercings. And the way Miller and Snyder depict them is just fascinatingly weird. A couple of early messengers are inky in their exaggerated blackness, and the Immortals, Xerxes’ regiment of elite fighters, are mutant ninjas who, when they get their masks knocked off, look like Jabba The Hutt’s palace guards. There’s also an executioner with crab-claw blades for arms and a massive warty ogre who looks like Sloth from The Goonies and who was played by the former WWF giant Kurrgan (Robert Maillet). The bad guys are so othered that they don’t even seem human."

"300 opens on a scene with a chasm full of baby skulls, the remains of the infants who were deemed unfit. Leonidas has no visible disabilities, so he gets to live. Then, as a kid, he’s indoctrinated into the warrior society, taught to fight or die, then sent off to survive on his own. He goes into the snow and kills an enormous CGI wolf; a real trained wolf, apparently, would not have looked badass enough. Snyder presents all this as badass shit. And later, he implies that the Spartans were right to kill off all their disabled children, since it’s a hunchbacked troll escapee who ultimately betrays Leonidas."

"Give them nothing but take from them everything!"

"SPARTANS, What is your profession?"

"Madness? THIS IS SPARTA!"

"A beautiful death!"

"A God-King must die!"

"They were 300 men, against a million!"

"Prepare for glory!"

"Tonight we dine in Hell!"

""Remember us." As simple an order as a king can give. "Remember why we died." For he did not wish tribute or song. No monuments, no poems of war and valour. His wish was simple: "Remember us," he said to me. That was his hope. 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 the Spartans, passer-by, that here, by Spartan law, we lie. So my king died, and my brothers died, barely a year ago. Long I pondered my king's cryptic talk of victory. But 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, laid down their lives, not just for Sparta, but for all Greece and the promise this country holds! Now, here on this ragged 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!"

""Immortals". They fail our king's test. And a man who fancies himself a god feels a very human chill crawl up his spine."

"[As the Arcadians join the fight with the Immortals] They shout and curse, stabbing wildly, more brawlers than warriors. They make a wondrous mess of things. Brave amateurs, they do their part."

"They have served the dark will of Persian 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. The god-king has betrayed a fatal flaw: hubris. Easy to taunt, easy to trick. Before wounds and weariness have taken their toll, the mad king throws the best he has at us. Xerxes has taken the bait. "Immortals" - we put their name to the test."

"[Regarding Leonidas' upbringing] 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 service to Sparta was the greatest glory he could achieve in his life."

"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 am not here to represent Leonidas. His actions speak louder than my words ever could. I am here for all those voices which cannot 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 are 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."

"[last words] My Queen!... My Wife!... My love..."

"Spartans! Ready your breakfast and eat hearty, for tonight, we dine in Hell!"

"THIS IS SPARTA!!!"

"[after Daxos and his men withdraw] No retreat, no surrender. That is Spartan law. And by Spartan law, we will stand and fight... and die. A new age has begun: an age of freedom! And all will know that 300 Spartans gave their last breath to defend it!"

"We will block the Persian coastal assault by rebuilding the great Phocian Wall. And from there, we will funnel them into the mountain pass we call the Hot Gates. Now, in that narrow corridor, their numbers will count for nothing, and wave after wave of Persian attack will smash against Spartan shields. Xerxes' losses will be so great, his men so demoralized, he will have no choice but to abandon his campaign!"

"The director says that the film’s (homo)sexual undertones were intended to make young straight males in the audience uncomfortable, because “What’s more scary to a 20-year-old boy than a giant god-king who wants to have his way with you?”"

"MP: Did you use any other films as reference materials for this? Something like Ben Hur, Gladiator (2000 film), or Lord of the Rings?"

"JA: Obviously, doing this movie probably caused you to do a lot of research on Greek and Persian armies. What was the most interesting thing you learned about this culture and the history of this? Did you get a good feel for that outside of Frank's work?"

"300 is largely faithful to your material. But it takes the character of Queen Gorgo, who only appears in a couple of panels in your version, and gives her a major subplot with a character called Theron, an evil politician. What did you think of that addition?"

"[voiceover] For two hundred years knights have fought and died for a land not our own. But on that day at Badon Hill, all who fought put our lives in service of a greater cause: Freedom. And as for the knights who gave their lives, their deaths were cause for neither mourning nor sadness. For they live forever, their names and deeds handed down from father to son, mother to daughter, in the legends of King Arthur and his knights."

"Pelagius told me once there is no worse death than the end of hope."

"Deeds in themselves are meaningless unless they are done for some higher purpose. We have waged a war to protect a Rome that doesn't exist. Is that the deed I am to be judged by?"

"What, that some men are born to be slaves? No, that isn't true."

"[to Gawain] Wondering at your good fortune that all your children look like me?"

"O merciful God, I have such need of Your mercy now. Not for myself, but for my knights, for this is truly their hour of need. Deliver them from their trials ahead and I will pay You a thousand fold with any sacrifice You ask of me. And if in Your wisdom, You should determine that sacrifice must be my life for theirs; so that they can once again taste the freedom that is so long been denied to them, I will gladly make that covenant. My death will have a purpose. I ask no more than that."

"Til Schweiger - Cynric"

"Stellan Skarsgård - Cerdic"

"Joel Edgerton - Gawain"

"Hugh Dancy - Galahad"

"Mads Mikkelsen - Tristan"

"Keira Knightley — Guinevere"

"Ioan Gruffudd — Lancelot"

"Clive Owen — Arthur"

"The Untold True Story That Inspired The Legend"

"Rule your destiny"

"Rule your fate"

"Jols: Arthur says for men to be men, they must first all be equal."

"Arthur. This is not Rome's fight. It is not your fight. All these long years we've been together, the trials we've faced, the blood we've shed... What was it all for, if not for the reward of freedom? And now when we are so close! When it is finally within our grasp - look at me! Does it all count for nothing?"

"Merlin: That sword you carry is made of iron from this earth, forged in the fires of Britain. It was love of your mother that freed the sword, not hatred of me. Love, Arthur."

"Let every man, woman, child bear witness that from this day, all Britons will be united in one common cause."

"My brave knights, I have failed you! I neither took you off this island...nor shared your fate."

"Knights! The gift of freedom is yours by right. But the home we seek resides not in some distant land. It's in us! And in our actions on this day! If this be our destiny, then so be it. But let history remember that as free men, we chose to make it so."

"You be my friend now and do not dissuade me. Seize the freedom you have earned and live it for the both of us. I cannot follow you, Lancelot. I now know that all the blood I have shed, all the lives I have taken have led me to this moment."