‘300’ is the latest Frank Miller graphic novel to become a major motion picture. It tells the story of 300 Spartan warriors who defend their country against the invading armies of Persia, whose numbers are in the millions. It’s a simplistic story that really isn’t the central focus of either the book or the film. Rather, both rely on fantastic visuals to help as their primary form of storytelling.

For the most part, ‘300’ the movie, much like 2005’s ‘Sin City’ (another Miller work), looks almost exactly like the graphic novel it’s based on. In fact, ‘300’ looks more like its source material than ‘Sin City’ did. Nearly everything from the movie matches what Miller and his colorist Lynn Varley did in the original book. It’s amazing how detailed the film is. The colors are matched perfectly to those of the graphic novel. Things like the swords and shields of the Spartans or the masks of the Persians seemed to be literally pulled from the pages of the book. Even the actors were completely transformed. Gerard Butler’s ‘King Leonidas’ is a spitting image of what Miller drew. Rodrigo Santoro of ‘Lost’ had perhaps the most amazing metamorphosis. The 6-foot-2 actor is almost unrecognizable as the 10-foot Persian god, king Xerxes. He simply towers over everyone, giving him a menacing presence.

As stated before, neither the graphic novel nor the movie have deep plots. However, that doesn’t mean that ‘300’ is a bad story. Far from it. Compared to other movies based on graphic novels like ‘American Splendor’ or ‘A History of Violence,’ however, the story of ‘300’ is almost too simplistic. That being said, the movie actually manages to tell a better story than the book. While the core story remains exactly as it is in the novel, scenes involving Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) were added to help move the story along better. While the character appears in the book, she is only there for a page or two. Here, she is a fully developed character who must stand on her own and convince the Spartan government to support her husband Leonidas and his quest to defend Sparta. Also, a sub-plot about a father and son in battle, only hinted upon in the book, is now completely realized in the movie. This adds a new layer of emotion not seen in the novel or in many other Hollywood action movies for that matter.

In the end, ‘300’ is more than just a faithful adaptation of a graphic novel. It is one of the few instances where a movie is actually better than the book that it is based on. It retains everything that made the source material great in the first place, while adding new elements to the story which give it an edge all its own. While many in the book-to-movie genre fail to live up to the original, ‘300’ is perhaps too faithful. The biggest flaw of the book, style over substance, remains in the big screen adaption. But in the end, despite its flaws, both are worthy of your time and money.