After a long disappointing summer season, THE HANGOVER was the biggest surprise hit of last year. Three weeks as the #1 movie in the country;the tenth highest-grossing film of 2009; a worldwide gross of over US$467 million; winner of the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy; and an overwhelming favorite of most movie critics. Here, check out what these stooges had to say about it:

As someone who has survived a Las Vegas bachelor party gone horribly, horribly wrong, I had even more of an empathic connection with the story than the rest of our group. As I recently found out, the plot of THE HANGOVER was inspired by a real event that happened to a friend of executive producer Chris Bender, where the friend had gone missing from his own Las Vegas bachelor party, blacked out and woke up in a strip club being threatened with a very, very large bill he was supposed to pay---This was my experience almost EXACTLY!*

If you've somehow managed to move the rock that trapped you in a cavern since last summer or recently been rescued from the Chilean mine, I recommend you stop whatever you're doing and go watch this movie on DVD right now!

...However, it's really not necessary that you buy The Hangover (Extreme Edition) Blu-ray.
In fact, if you're one of the few people who waited to see The Hangover after it was already overhyped for you, I would recommend you stay far, far away from this particular edition.


By now you have to know that all of these "Unrated" and "Extreme" editions are a bit misleading. There's never a significant amount of etxra scenes, cursing or nudity in them. Usually just more cutting room floor footage to pad out the content. While this set seems to promise much with the tag "Plus lots more!", there really isn't. Here's the list and you tell me if you spot anything not on most Blu-rays:

• Picture-in-Picture Commentary with Director Todd Phillips along with Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, and Zach Galifianakis.
• Map of Destruction: An interactive map that allows users to retrace path of the whole Vegas misadventure.
• The Madness of Ken Jeong : alternate takes and deleted ad libs of Ken Jeong in character as "Leslie Chow" .
• Action Mash-Up : A montage of the film's action beats.
• Three Best Friends Song : The full version of Zach Galifianakis singing the "Best Friends" song.
• The Dan Band!: The Dan Band delivers a spirited rendition of "Fame."
• Gag Reel
• More Pictures from the Missing Camera
• BD-Live Functionality

See? Nothing special. Even less special because every featurette from this list is way short and unimpressive. With that cast like this with such great chemistry you might expect something in the way of humor, funny stories and secret info for the commentary, but instead you're watching four guys just sitting there looking at the movie. I was excited about the interactive map but it's annoyingly simplistic and not worth the load time to wait for the short clips.

One of the best things about the movie was that just when you're sad that it's ending it delivers the biggest prize to the audience- the boys find the missing camera that chronicles their night of untold debauchery and just when expect the final fade to black, the end credits reveal all the photos in graphic detail.
Well, maybe not ALL.

I gotta admit that for all the trouble they got into, the partying they did in those photos made it look like it was worth it. I suppose if there's one legitimate item to sell this deluxe set on it's the promise of even MORE. Besides the ones you have to (painfully) slowly click through on the disc, this Extreme Edition also comes with a hardbound "DELUXE FULL-COLOR 28-PAGE WEDDING PHOTO ALBUM – NEVER-BEFORE-SEEN CANDID SHOTS OF THE SECRET VEGAS CEREMONY AND CELEBRATION THAT THE MOVIE DIDN’T SHOW!! ---as well as a CD Soundtrack sampler with 5 songs from the movie!

It's real nice if you like that sort of thing. Can say that I did because I liked the idea in the movie that all the digital evidence was going to be erased. When I go to Las Vegas any guy in our group who whips out a camera is immediately ejected and shunned. By the very nature of "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas", there should be NOTHING resembling a well-produced photo album chronicling your trip!

I'm assuming that this The Hangover (Extreme Edition) Blu-ray has been pumped out is to drum up interest of new Todd Phillips/ Zach Galifianakis movie, "DUE DATE" which is only days away from being released in theaters. Hell, the copy I have came with a coupon for up to $7.50 off the admission to DUE DATE, so there you go.

I still think THE HANGOVER is the funny movie you can watch that doesn't have Sacha Baron Cohen or Johnny Knoxville in it, and I would tell everybody it's definitely worth owning. But don't feel like you have to spend the $$ for this iteration of it.

But if you do it can be purchased here.

* Actually, I was the friend of the guy that happened to but it was up to me to get us out of there.