Dirty Work was supposed to be the movie that would propel Saturday Night Live’s Norm MacDonald to movie stardom. Sadly, it didn’t work out that way, with the film only earning a modest $10 million theatrically. One of the reasons the movie tanked was that, at the eleventh hour, the studio forced director Bob Saget (yes – THAT Bob Saget) to recut what had been planned as a raunchy R-rated comedy to a PG-13, much more mainstream effort. This was a big mistake as MacDonald wasn’t Adam Sandler, and this mean-spirited movie about petty revenge and scheming was never meant to be a family flick.
Even still, despite the cutdown there were still some pretty funny scenes in the movie, and when it hit VHS and cable, it became a bit of a cult hit. With both MacDonald and Saget having passed away, the good folks at Vinegar Syndrome have undertaken a massive restoration of the film, and have re-assembled the original, unrated cut and are releasing it to 4K Blu-ray Disc this June. The unrated cut only runs one minute longer than the theatrical cut, but it apparently contains a lot of alternate footage, as when Saget made the PG-13 version, he used a lot of alternate takes, jokes, and tame deleted footage for the cut. Thus, the two versions are distinct. As a bonus, there’s also a 2-hour assembly cut of the movie being included, although it was sourced from the best possible elements, which, in this case, is an old VHS transfer. This assembly cut was never meant to be released, so it’s being included as more of a curiosity.
Here are the rest of the extras (courtesy of our friends at Blu-Ray.com)
- THREE-DISC SET (4K BLU-RAY/TWO BLU-RAYS)
- NEW 4K RESTORATIONS OF THE THEATRICAL (82 MIN.) AND EXTENDED (83 MIN.) CUTS OF THE FILM
- DOLBY VISION/HDR PRESENTATION OF THE FILM
- Commentary track with co-writer Frank Sebastiano and Mike Hunchback (Theatrical Cut)
- Commentary track with co-writer Frank Sebastiano and co-writer/actor Fred Wolf (Dirtier Cut)
- “Note to Self: Doing Dirty Work” (63 min) – a newly produced making-of documentary featuring interviews with the cast and crew
- “Hey Jim, It’s Norm” (19 min) – an interview with actor Jim Downey and co-writer Frank Sebastiano
- “The Last Word” (16 min) – an interview with co-writer Frank Sebastiano and co-writer/actor Fred Wolf
- Front Row” (9 min) – an interview with assistant director Alan Goluboff
- “Cutting Dirty Work” (6 min) – an interview with first assistant editor Ryan Folsey
- “Excuse Me” (8 min) – an interview with co-writer/actor Fred Wolf
- “Revenge for Hire” (9 min) – an interview with co-writer Frank Sebastiano
- “Face First” (7 min) – an interview with Norm’s stunt double Brian Jagersky
- “Fully Loaded” (8 min) – an interview with actor David Koechner
- “Nose Biter” (5 min) – an interview with actress Uni Park
- “Quicksand” (8 min) – an interview with actor Kevin Farley
- “Two Dollars” (11 min) – an interview with actor Jim Downey
- 2-hour Assembly Cut of Dirty Work (sourced from video)
- Alternate extended ending
- Original trailer
- 40-page perfect bound book with essays by Dan Ozzi, John Dieringer, and Oscar Becher (Limited Edition Only)
- Reversible sleeve artwork
- English SDH subtitles
Also, kudos to the label for making what most be the most disgusting 4K Blu-ray cover of all time:
UUUUURGH. Will you add this one to your shelf? Let us know in the comments!
