Knocked Up: Extended and Unprotected (HD DVD) (2007)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy Drama	Menu Animation & Audio Screen Saver Deleted Scenes-(18:54) Additional Footage-Extended & Alternate Scenes (8:29) Featurette-Line-o-rama (3:32) Outtakes-Gag Reel (3:27) Featurette-Making Of-Roller Coaster Documentary (5:19) Featurette-Directing the Director (7:40) Music Video-Loudon Wainwright lll- You Can't Fail Me Now Additional Footage-Topless Scene (0:33) Audio Commentary-Judd Apatow, Seth Rogen, Bill Hader On-Screen Information Track-U-Control: PIP Interviews Web Links-Web-Enabled Features
Rating
Year Of Production	2007
Running Time	132:48
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Judd Apatow
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Seth Rogen Katherine Heigl Paul Rudd Leslie Mann Jason Segel Jay Baruchel Jonah Hill Martin Starr Charlyne Yi Iris Apatow Maude Apatow Joanna Kerns Harold Ramis
Case	Amaray Variant
RPI	$39.95	Music	Joe Henry Loudon Wainwright III Tommy Lee

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 French Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 Italian Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 German Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 Spanish Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 Japanese Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.85:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	1080p
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English French Italian German Spanish Japanese Korean Swedish Danish Finnish Dutch Norwegian Portuguese Mandarin	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	Yes
		Action In or After Credits	Yes

    Ben (Seth Rogen, who also executive produces) is an immature lay-about with no desire to find a focus in his life. An illegal Canadian immigrant, he has been living his post-high school years squandering the proceeds of an insurance payout he received as a kid, but that well is very close to running dry. He shares a bachelor pad with his mates and together they aspire to launching a celebrity nude database on the internet, fleshofthestars.com. What an innovation!

    Ben's life is changed immeasurably when he meets Alison (Katherine Heigl) while out with his mates at a local nightclub. Alison is an attractive, career-minded woman who is completely out of his league - it would seem. Much to Ben's surprise, they meet, exchange drunken banter and end up at her place where they dance the horizontal Lambada. All is sour the following morning when it is quickly apparent they have nothing in common, a fact that is exacerbated by Ben's crass humour and lack of regard for female company. Can the slob be redeemed?

    Eight weeks pass by and Ben receives a phone call from Alison - she's pregnant. How will bodacious Ben react to the bomb she drops? What does Alison hope to gain by including this knucklehead in the rearing of her child?

    From Director/Writer Judd Apatow (The 40 Year Old Virgin), Knocked Up is a fairly pedestrian affair that should enjoy broad appeal. On one hand, the film sports a significant amount of bodily function humour that will certainly appeal to easily distracted audiences. Scratch the surface, and you'll notice everyday, familial situations that new parents will surely relate to. I viewed the film with my other half and we often lamented situations in the film that we deal with regularly as parents. I imagine there'd be a lot of material contained here that would be a dose of reality to prospective parents who aren't quite sure what lifestyle changes to expect when bringing a baby into the world.

    As a comedy, I found it a bit inconsistent and much too long. This isn't a film that challenges or covers any new ground for audiences, as it literally repackages a cross-section of jokes that were already given mileage years ago on Everybody Loves Raymond. Admittedly, this is the extended cut, but I seriously feel some scenes are pure, unnecessary padding. How can studios give a master director such as Terry Gilliam a hard time with final cut, but films like this find their way to the cinema at ridiculous lengths. I guess it comes down to target audience, but I would really like to know what teen couples would be happy to sit through nearly two and a half hours of comedy-birthing-drama. I certainly can't imagine this film receiving multiple viewings at my place.

    If you're a particularly big fan of Apatow's previous work, this might not be quite what you were hoping for. Having said that, I do think the film will have broad appeal to couples young and old, so you may want to give it a rent first.

Video

    The 1080p transfer is framed in the film's original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1, with thin black bars top and bottom.

    The transfer is intermittently soft and lacks a certain vibrancy that makes other HD transfers leap off the screen. After viewing the film several times, I've put this down to a focus-pulling issue, as some scenes seem to waver in and out of focus slightly. There are nice textures to be found here and there, and good depth to outdoor scenes in particular. Black levels are strong when need be, and shadow detail is excellent.

    Colours are bold and rich throughout the film, without a hint of noise to be seen. Skin tones appear absolutely realistic.

    VC-1 video compression has been applied, with not a single visible glitch to my eyes. The transfer is similarly free of film artefacts, although a very slight, inconsequential wash of film grain can be seen in some scenes it is never an issue.

    English subtitles are provided and follow the dialogue closely, but I did note a few Americanisms in the text.

    The disc is a dual layered, HD-30 type.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    Besides its original English audio (Dolby Digital Plus 5.1), the feature is accompanied by five foreign language dubs and two audio commentaries. The default soundtrack is determined by the viewer's selection from an initial language select menu that loads prior to the main menu page.

    The English dialogue is absolutely crystal clear, I never had a problem discerning what was being said. The film's ADR seems fine and audio sync is great.

    Being primarily a dialogue-driven film, the surround channels aren't given a lot of work to do. Some convincing nightclub noise and pumping music springs from the rear channels during the first few scenes, while outdoor scenes often utilise the surrounds for atmospheric effects. Voices are generally confined to the front centre channel.

    The score is comprised of vast blend of contemporary pop and rock, with contributions by artists as diverse as Loudon Wainwright III and Tommy Lee. Some additional portions of music are attributed to guitarist Lyle Workman, who toured with Sting recently.

    The subwoofer adds a little bottom end to the score, and that's it. There isn't a lot of call for LFE activity.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    This is a great selection of extra material. All are of a 1.78:1 aspect and presented in HD where noted.

Menu & Screen Saver

My Scenes

    The viewer is able to commit their favourite scenes to the player's memory by pressing 'B' button on the remote. These can be accessed again whenever the disc is inserted.

Deleted Scenes (18:54)

    There are fourteen extra scenes in all, playable individually or as a whole. Most scenes are comprised of additional character interaction, while others are simply awkward outbursts of dialogue that would be more at home in a gag reel. The most interesting inclusion is an alternate ending that changes the sex of the baby, complete with feel-good montage. The deleted Brokeback Mountain rant is a classic, and should have been included in this extended cut in my opinion.

Extended & Alternate Scenes (8:29)

    Four slightly different or extended scenes from the film, prolonging gags that don't necessarily need drawing out.

Featurette- Line-o-rama (3:32)

    A rapid slew of dialogue from various characters, showing the improvisation that was allowed on set.

Gag Reel (3:27)

    A compilation of amusing goofs and botches lines.

Roller Coaster Documentary (5:19)

    A short piece about a day of filming that was spent at a theme park, gaining footage of the male cast on a roller coaster. Actor Jay Baruchel suffers an acute fear of these rides, which does not perturb Director Judd Apatow in the slightest.

Featurette- Directing the Director (7:40)

    It has been said that after numerous clashes with Universal over the dailies coming from his shoot, the studio sent in Capote Director Bennett Miller to watch over Judd Apatow's shoulder. Apatow calls Miller a "douche-bag" and we see Miller debunking actor's motivation before filming scenes. This is bogus, and not particularly funny. The staged 'punch-up' at the end is ridiculous.

Music Clip- Loudon Wainwright lll- Live at McCabe's- You Can't Fail Me Now

    A nice acoustic performance of a song that is featured in the film, with additional vocals by Joe Henry.

Additional Footage- Topless Scene (0:33)

    An alternate version of a familiar scene from the film. Not what you might be expecting.

Audio Commentary- Judd Apatow (Writer/Director), Seth Rogen (Actor/ Executive Producer), Bill Hader (Actor)

    Apatow admits to knowing nothing about lenses or cameras or directing in general for that matter, so there's not a lot of 'tech-talk' to offer budding filmmakers here. The gents discuss the casting process (or lack thereof) and how some scenes were improvised. When the talk turns stale, the guys throw some names at Hader for celebrity impersonations, which grows thin pretty quickly. They also talk about alternate scenes that were shot and discuss Apatow's personal, real-life experiences that made their way into the film (you'd be surprised how much of the script is just the director's life spilled onto paper). Details of Judd's many fruitless attempts to contribute scripts to the series Everybody Loves Raymond marks the humorous highlight of this otherwise pedestrian commentary.

U-Control- Picture in Picture (HD)

    The U-Control feature is capable of offering an array of interactive content while the feature is playing, but this particular title only offers Picture In Picture featurettes, available for nineteen of the film's twenty scenes. The beauty of this disc is, if you can't be bothered sitting through the whole film to get to the bonus stuff, they are all accessible directly via the scene selection menu or the U-Control menu. Most of these are no more than a few minutes long, but they offer some interesting Cast & Crew Interviews and behind the scenes footage. The picture in picture volume is independently adjustable, which is handy.

Web-Enabled Interactive Features

    If your HD DVD player is ethernet-enabled, you can access trailers, exclusive content and updates online with a click of your remote.

    The video transfer is good.

    The audio transfer is great.

    The extras offer worthwhile insight into the production.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall