Blu-ray Review: Meet the Spartans

THE MOVIE: 1/2 star out of 5
When I was a teenager all those many years ago, I could not wait until the new issue of Mad Magazine arrived in the mail each month. Each issue would offer a very funny spoof involving a current film, often with some witty and biting social commentary to boot. Meet the Spartans is a spoof also, this time of the movie 300. However, there is one major difference between the Mad Magazine spoofs of long ago and Meet the Spartans, namely humor and wit. Meet the Spartans has none. I am zilch, nada. This is one bad film and is filmed with nothing but gay jokes, sexist jokes and bad sight gags. Not even throwing the gang at American Idol down the pit of death is enough to redeem this film. The biggest let down of all has to be Carmen Electra in HD. Lord, the years have not been kind. Do yourself a favor and pass on this one.

THE VIDEO: 4 3/4 stars out of 5
Meet the Spartans is presented on a 25 GB disc and is encoded with AVC in its original aspect ratio of 1:85:1. LO and behold, the video on this release is excellent, much better than the film deserves quite frankly. Clarity and color are excellent with very natural looking skin tones. Detail, especially in the faces of the actors is excellent as well ,which in the case of the aforementioned Ms. Electra is not necessarily a good thing! Black level is deep and solid with a very fine three dimensional image. There is really little to quibble about with video quality of this release. If only the film itself was up to the level of the encode just a little bit.

THE AUDIO: 4 3/8 stars out of 5
The audio here is encoded with DTS HD Master Audio and is excellent as well, albeit not quite up to the level of the audio. Dialogue is well recorded and well placed in the mix. Usually, this is an asset. But with this dialogue.... The overall sound of the release is smooth and detailed with excellent bass response. However, it lacks the openness of the better sounding releases and lacks the total immersive feel of the best audio tracks. I have no doubts that fans of this film will enjoy the audio on this release. However, I found it to come up just a tad short of the bet sounding releases.

IN CONCLUSION
Despite the excellent quality of the video on this release, I have to recommend that you pass on this film. It is that bad.

For more high-def news, please click: TVPredictions.com.