Meet the Spartans (Unrated 'Pit of Death' Edition)

Rating PG13 Formats DVD Genre comedy Starring Sean Maguire, Carmen Electra, Kevin Sorbo Directed by Jason Friedberg Publisher 20th Century Fox

Farce movies are at their lowest point in movie history. From the great Mel Brooks movies to Airplane! and The Naked Gun, farce films used to be a fun escape into the realms to stupid comedy. The jokes were pulled off with sharp with and brilliantly funny acting. Meet the Spartans goes against what makes comedy funny, and crams about fifty cheap gags into seventy minutes of film.

As far as plot goes, this movie is nothing more than a play by play of 300 with random horrible humor thrown in. This movie was made with the assumption the viewer has already seen 300, as nothing much is explained as to what is happening. Not that it matters, because ninety percent of the film consists of random unfunny humor anyways.

The characters in the film are poorly acted versions of the 300 cast. Not a single one stands out as being funny or interesting. They walk out, act as one dimensional as possible, and pray to God that somebody finds them funny. In this comedy, laughs come sparse.

Meet the Spartans has three types of humor: Disgusting, violent, and pointless. The disgusting humor ranges from every single bodily function possible, with enough saliva, urine, vomit and feces jokes to last me a lifetime. The first ten seconds of the movie involves somebody being vomited on. Not even a minute into the movie, and I’m ready to throw the DVD out the window.

The violent humor makes a lame attempt at slapstick, with people being randomly kicked or punched with exaggerative sound effects. It’s similar to a dumbed down version of The Three Stooges style of humor. Some of the violent humor can be just plain offensive at times. There’s a bit involving the child abuse of the Spartan children that is not funny, period. Why would anybody laugh at a boy getting bloodied up by his muscular father? Shock value in small doses can work if it’s done properly. This time around, it’s as if writers Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer sat down and discussed how many ways people could be offended or disgusted. It’s a mystery how they could ever find the humor in topics like that.

The random humor comes in the form of sudden appearances of pop culture. A few were worthy or a chuckle or two, especially the "American Idol" spoof at the pit of death. The comic effect wears off quickly as these spoofs kept reappearing within about ten seconds of each other. There is never any breathing room, and the filmmakers never knew when enough was enough. Not to mention the spoof of You Got Served is about five whole minutes of breakdancing Spartans. It gets old. All of the elements of good comedy are completely absent, including actor chemistry, line delivery, fun scenarios and interesting characters.

The DVD extras are actually better than the film itself. My favorite is a behind-the-scenes featurette with on-set interviews with the crew and cast. What amazes me is the cast seems funnier when they’re not acting. They obviously had a fun time making the film, and I enjoyed watching them joke around and goof off for the camera. Another fun extra is a quiz to see how well you know your pop culture. If you honestly know all the answers, then you need to get a life.

With awful dialogue, heartless characters, no plot, and unvaried pacing, it’s a miracle this movie ever made it to the silver screen. I couldn’t recommend this movie to anybody. Buying this DVD will waste your hard earned money that could go something useful. If you’re looking for farce laughs, stick with Mel Brooks.