Cameron Crowe loves music. This much is obvious. His 2000 film, Almost Famous, is a loving, semi-autobiographical account of his time writing for Rolling Stone in the early 1970s.

With the recent DVD release of Almost Famous: Untitled, the director's cut bootleg of the film, Crowe wishes to create for his viewer the experience of music bootlegs. Instead of just providing the typical extra features such as director's commentary, theatrical trailer, cast and filmmaker bios and production notes, Crowe wants to give fans of his film a complete look at the film.

To do this he's packed the two DVDs with so many special features that anyone who spends a few hours viewing them will know more than imaginably possible about the movie.

To start with is the director's cut, which is over 35 minutes longer than the original theatrical version, which of course is included here too. Not much is added in the extra minutes. It's easy to see why most of them ended up out of the movie. They don't, however, make the movie any less enjoyable. For people who already have seen the original and want to see more, the director's cut is a great opportunity to see what didn't make it.

And there's so much more. There are more deleted scenes, the best of which is a scene cut because of Crowe's inability to get permission to use "Stairway to Heaven." In the deleted scene cues are given to cue up the song and play it along with the movie. There's also a short interview with the real Lester Bangs, who was played phenomenally by Philip Seymour Hoffman. There's a short concert by Stillwater, the fake band from the movie. There are seven Rolling Stones articles by Crowe, including the Allman Brothers Band article that inspired the film. There's a list of Crowe's 10 favorite albums of 1973. There's behind the scenes footage. There's even a six song CD by Stillwater, which includes at least one surprisingly good song, "Love Comes and Goes."

With all of these features anyone who enjoyed Almost Famous will love this DVD and those that didn't should stay far, far away from those who just purchased this movie. They're sure to spend hours playing with the special features.

— Reviewed by Reid Coploff