Anne Thompson of Variety calls ’300′ a triumph of technology:
Beyond turning Gerard Butler into an action star and revitalizing the R rating, “300″ is going to have a big impact, because it has proved the effectiveness of a moviemaking technique that blends stylized graphic and live-action elements seamlessly — and at $64 million, relatively inexpensively.It’s the birth of a new hybrid cinema, says genre marketing consultant Jeff Conner (“The Animatrix”). “Call it live-action anime. It’s like doing a high school play on a stage with digital backdrops. It’s a new visual language with a different reality.”