Quotes

300

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Messenger: Choose your next words carefully, Leonidas. They may be your last as king.
King Leonidas: [to himself: thinking] "Earth and water"?
[Leonidas unsheathes and points his sword at the Messenger's throat]
Messenger: Madman! You're a madman!
King Leonidas: Earth and water? You'll find plenty of both down there.
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!
Messenger: This is blasphemy! This is madness!
King Leonidas: Madness...?
[shouting]
King Leonidas: This is Sparta!
[Kicks the messenger down the well]

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Stelios: It's an honor to die at your side.
King Leonidas: It's an honor to have lived at yours.

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Queen Gorgo: Do not be coy or stupid, Persian. You can afford neither in Sparta!
Messenger: What makes this woman think she can speak among men?
Queen Gorgo: Because only Spartan women give birth to real men!

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Spartan King Leonidas: Spartans! Ready your breakfast and eat hearty... For tonight, we dine in hell!

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Daxos: I see I was wrong to expect Sparta's commitment to at least match our own.
King Leonidas: Doesn't it?
[points to Arcadian soldier behind Daxos]
King Leonidas: You there, what is your profession?
Free Greek-Potter: I am a potter... sir.
King Leonidas: [points to another soldier] And you, Arcadian, what is your profession?
Free Greek-Sculptor: Sculptor, sir.
King Leonidas: Sculptor.
[turns to a third soldier]
King Leonidas: You?
Free Greek-Blacksmith: Blacksmith.
King Leonidas: [turns back shouting] SPARTANS! What is YOUR profession?
Spartans: HA-OOH! HA-OOH! HA-OOH!
King Leonidas: [turning to Daxos] You see, old friend? I brought more soldiers than you did!

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[as arrows rain down on the Spartans, Astinos begins laughing hysterically]
Stelios: What the hell are you laughing at?
Astinos: Well, you had to say it!
Stelios: What?
Astinos: "Fight in the shade"!
[both laugh]

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Xerxes: Come Leonidas, let us reason together. It would be a regrettable waste. It would be nothing short of madness for you, brave king, and your valiant troops to perish. All because of a simple misunderstanding. There is much our cultures could share.
King Leonidas: Haven't you noticed? We've been sharing our culture with you all morning.

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[Dilios is putting a patch over his eye]
King Leonidas: Dilios, I trust that "scratch" hasn't made you useless.
Dilios: Hardly, my lord, it's just an eye. The gods saw fit to grace me with a spare.

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Persian: A thousand nations of the Persian empire will descend upon you. Our arrows will blot out the sun!
Stelios: Then we will fight in the shade.

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King Leonidas: This is where we hold them.
[pause]
King Leonidas: This is where we fight!
[pause]
King Leonidas: And this is where THEY DIE!
Captain: On these shield, boys!
Spartans: AU!
King Leonidas: Remember this day, men, for it will be yours for all time!
Persian General: [the Persian general advances from the crowd of the Persian warriors on horseback] SPARTANS! Lay down your weapons!
[pause]
King Leonidas: [one of the Spartan men throws a spear directly at the Persian general, killing him; he falls from his horse dead] PERSIANS!
[the Spartans get into their shielding position]
King Leonidas: COME AND GET THEM!
Captain: [the angry Persian soldiers start charging towards the Spartans] HOLD!
King Leonidas: Give them NOTHING! But take from them EVERYTHING!
Captain: STAY READY!

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Spartan King Leonidas: [his last lines] My Queen! My wife. My love...

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Dilios: "Goodbye my love." He doesn't say it. There's no room for softness... not in Sparta. No place for weakness. Only the hard and strong may call themselves Spartans. Only the hard, only the strong.

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Dilios: "Remember us." As simple an order as a king can give. "Remember why we died." For he did not wish tribute, nor song, nor monuments nor poems of war and valor. 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, passerby, that here by Spartan law, we lie."

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King Leonidas: Spartans! Prepare for glory!
Daxos: Glory? Have you gone mad? There is no glory to be had now! Only retreat, or surrender or death!
King Leonidas: Well, that's an easy choice for us, Arcadian! Spartans never retreat! Spartans never surrender! Go spread the word. Let every Greek assembled know the truth of this. Let each among them search his own soul. And while you're at it, search your own.

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Xerxes: But I am a generous god. I can make you rich beyond all measure. I will make you warlord of all Greece. You will carry my battle standard to the heart of Europa. Your Athenian rivals will kneel at your feet if you will but kneel at mine.
King Leonidas: You are generous as you are divine, O king of kings. Such an offer only a madman would refuse. But the, uh, the idea of kneeling, it's- You see, slaughtering all those men of yours has, uh, well it's left a nasty cramp in my leg, so kneeling will be hard for me.

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King Leonidas: You have many slaves, Xerxes, but few warriors. It won't be long before they fear my spears more than your whips.

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Queen Gorgo: Spartan!
King Leonidas: Yes, my lady?
Queen Gorgo: Come back with your shield, or on it.
King Leonidas: Yes, my lady.

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King Leonidas: You there, Ephialtes. May you live forever.
[Ephialtes cringes and hangs his head]

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Queen Gorgo: Freedom isn't free at all, that it comes with the highest of costs. The cost of blood.

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Dilios: His helmet was 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]

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King Leonidas: [on being told the Persians are coming to parley] Captain, I leave you in charge.
Captain: But, sire...
King Leonidas: Relax, old friend. If they assassinate me, all of Sparta goes to war. Pray they're that stupid. Pray we're that lucky.
[He takes another bite of apple, as the Captain notices a Persian soldier, still alive]
King Leonidas: Besides, there's no reason we can't be civil, is there?
Captain: [stabs the Persian] None, sire.

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Xerxes: It isn't wise to stand against me, Leonidas. Imagine what horrible fate awaits my enemies when I would gladly kill any of my own men for victory.
King Leonidas: And I would die for any one of mine.

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Dilios: Immortals... we put their name to the test.

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Xerxes: You Greeks take pride in your logic. I suggest you employ it. Consider the beautiful land you so vigorously defend. Picture it reduced to ash at my whim! Consider the fate of your women!
Spartan King Leonidas: Clearly you don't know our women! I might as well have marched them up here, judging by what I've seen.

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King Leonidas: This is where we hold them! This is where we fight! This is where they die!
Captain: Earn these shields, boys!
[Spartans cheer]
King Leonidas: Remember this day, men, for it will be yours for all time.

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[last lines]
Dilios: And so my king died, and my brothers 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 three hundred, so far from home, laid down their lives. Not just for Sparta, but for all Greece and the promise this country holds.
[takes his spear from a soldier]
Dilios: Now, here on this ragged patch of earth called Plataea, Xerxes's hordes face obliteration!
Spartan Army: HA-OOH!
Dilios: 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 three hundred. Yet they stare now across the plain at *ten thousand* Spartans commanding thirty thousand free Greeks! HA-OOH!
Spartan Army: HA-OOH! HA-OOH! HA-OOH!
Dilios: 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 future brighter than anything we can imagine.
[puts on his helmet]
Dilios: Give thanks, men, to Leonidas and the brave 300! TO VICTORY!
[the Greek army roars and charges]

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Queen Gorgo: [having stabbed Theron and while holding sword into his body] This will not be over quickly. You will not enjoy this. I am not your Queen!

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Dilios: It's been more than thirty years since the wolf and the winter cold. And now, as then, it is not fear that grips him, only restlessness. A heightened sense of things. The seaborn breeze, coolly, 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. Everyone of them ready, to die.

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[Gorgo waking up from Leonidas stroking her back]
Queen Gorgo: Your lips can finish what your fingers have started... or has the Oracle robbed you of your desire as well?
King Leonidas: It would take more than the words than a drunken adolescent girl to rob me of my desire of you.

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Xerxes: 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 pulled out, and their tongues cut from their mouths. Why, uttering the very name of Sparta, or Leonidas, will be punishable by death! The world will never know you existed at all!
King Leonidas: The world will know that free men stood against a tyrant, that few stood against many, and before this battle was over, even a god-king can bleed.

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Ephialtes: There is nothing to forgive, brave King. I know what I look like...
King Leonidas: [quietly] You wear the crimson of a Spartan.
Ephialtes: My mother's love led my parents to flee Sparta... lest I be discarded...
King Leonidas: Your shield and armor?
Ephialtes: My father's, sir!
[pause]
Ephialtes: I beg you, bold King, to permit me to redeem my father's name by serving you in combat!
[pause]
Ephialtes: 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!
[pause]
Ephialtes: I will earn my father's armor, noble King, by serving you in the battle!
King Leonidas: [Ephialtes shows King Leonidas his thrust; it's good and the King is surprisingly impressed] A fine thrust.
Ephialtes: [smiles] I will kill *many* Persians!
King Leonidas: Raise your shield.
Ephialtes: Sire?
King Leonidas: Raise your shield as high as you can.
[Ephialtes tries to raise his shield; he cannot as his physical disability prevents it]
King Leonidas: [calmly] 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.
[Leonidas takes his sword and shield to demonstrate]
King Leonidas: A single weak spot and the phalanx shatters. From thigh to neck, Ephialtes.
[pause]
King Leonidas: I am sorry, my friend; but not all of us were made to be soldiers.
Ephialtes: [shocked] But, I-!
King Leonidas: If you want to help in a Spartan victory, clear the battlefield of the dead, tend the wounded, bring them water. But as for the fight itself, I cannot use you.

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Dilios: The captain's cries of pain at the loss of his son are more frightening to the enemy than the deepest battle drums. It takes three men to restrain him and bring him back to our own.

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Dilios: We did what we were trained to do, what we were bred to do, what we were born to do!

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[before leaving]
Dilios: Sire, any message...?
King Leonidas: For the Queen?
[Dilios nods. Leonidas removes the wolf's fang pendant from around his neck, and presses it into Dilios's hand]
King Leonidas: None that need be spoken.

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Statesman: My good king! My good king! The oracle has spoken.
Second Statesman: The Ephors have spoken. There must be no march!
Theron: It is the law, my lord. The Spartan army must not go to war.
King Leonidas: Nor shall it. I've issued no such orders. I'm here, just taking a stroll, stretching my legs. These, uh, 300 men are my personal bodyguard.

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King Leonidas: Children, gather round! 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!

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Messenger: All that God-King Xerxes requires is this: a simple offering of earth and water. A token of Sparta's submission to the will of Xerxes.
King Leonidas: Submission? Well that's a bit of a problem. See, rumor has it the Athenians have already turned you down, and if those philosophers and, uh, boy-lovers have found that kind of nerve, then...
Theron: We must be diplomatic.
King Leonidas: [ignoring Theron] ... and, of course, Spartans have their reputation to consider.

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King Leonidas: Then what must a king do to save his world when the very laws he has sworn to protect force him to do nothing?
Queen Gorgo: It is not a question of what a Spartan citizen should do, nor a husband, nor a king. Instead, ask yourself, my dearest love, what should a free man do?

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Queen Gorgo: 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.

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[while wrestling with his son]
King Leonidas: In the end, a Spartan's true strength is the warrior next to him. So give respect and honor to him, and it will be returned to you. First, you fight with your head...
Queen Gorgo: Then you fight with your heart.
King Leonidas: [sees the Captain] What is it?
Queen Gorgo: A Persian messenger awaits you.
King Leonidas: Do not forget today's lesson.
Pleistarchos: Respect and honor.
King Leonidas: Respect and honor.

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Captain: [Battling the Persians] NO PRISONERS!
King Leonidas: [Stabbing a Persian soldier] NO MERCY!

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Dilios: The old ones say we Spartans are descended from Hercules himself. Bold Leonidas gives testament to our bloodline. His roar is long and loud.

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Spartan King Leonidas: A new age has begun, an age of freedom. And all will know that 300 Spartans gave their last breath to defend it.

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Dilios: It's been more than thirty years since the wolf and the winter cold. And now, as then, a beast approaches; patient and confident, savoring the meal to come. 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.

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

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Queen Gorgo: There's only one woman's words that should affect the mood of my husband. Those are mine.

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Daxos: I saw those ships smashed on the rocks. How can this be?
Stelios: We saw but a fraction of the monster that is Xerxes' army.
Daxos: There can be no victory here. Why do you smile?
Stelios: Arcadian, I've fought countless times, yet I've never met an adversary who could offer me what we Spartans call "A Beautiful Death." I can only hope, with all the world's warriors gathered against us, there might be one down there who's up to the task.

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Theron: [before raping Queen Gorgo] This will not be over quickly. You will not enjoy this. I'm not your king.

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Dilios: Hundreds leave, a handful stay. Only one looks back.

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Dilios: 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.

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