How To Lose Friends And Alienate People

Mandatory (although thankfully, skippable) trailers for Ghost Town and the direct-to-video Without A Paddle 2 begin the disc. The presentation is decent, with reasonably stylish, minimalist and non-spoilery menus with Pegg staring at us and looking a delightfully self-satisfied smeghead.

I see no problems with the presentation of How To Lose Friends And Alienate People on DVD. It's a good, clean, detailed video transfer with no standout problems. The Dolby Digital 5.1 surround track is your typical comedy surround track, completely lacking in obvious aural chicanery, but embellished with surround mixes of contemporary pop and other standout music - it's a reasonable enough soundstage, but never drowns out the vocal work, which is well recorded. It is as expected, and well-done.

There are two commentaries on the disc - first up is a solo effort by director Robert Weide. It's a decent enough yak-track, rarely with any major silence. He discusses the movie as though it is a documentary of what happened the day each scene was shot, recalling anecdotes, brief facts and how each of the main cast joined.

Also, there is commentary with Weide and star Simon Pegg. A slightly jokey and infrequently entertaining slice of jibberish. There's not much in the way of facts or funny gags, and considerable overlap between the director commentary, although Pegg's infectious geekery often shines through. Ultimately, it is a fluff piece to add another bullet-point to the back of the disc packaging.

Ten deleted scenes whipped straight off the editorial hard drives before sound mixing - totalling up to 15 minutes, and complete with optional commentary by Robert Weide - furnish the disc. Almost entirely wisely cut, they're pretty dreadful.

The longest gag-reel in the long history of DVD extras is next - running at more than half an hour. I freely admit skimming this after the first ten minutes of flubs and corpsing. It's the usual stuff.

Simon Pegg Blogs follow next. They're short video diary extras, comprised entirely of B-roll, which is almost entirely information free. It does impart a flavour of how everyone fit together, and the overall atmosphere on set. For fans only.

The presentation is good, the extras are so-so.