Top 10 Extreme celebrity makeovers

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Peter Jackson

When he took us to Middle Earth with The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Peter Jackson had his own King Kong-sized waistline to contend with.

But while making his film about the mighty ape, the director decided it was time to drop some major weight. After losing over 70 pounds on a diet of muesli, yogurt and soup, and getting Lasik eye surgery, the Academy Award-winning director was almost unrecognizable. Good thing he kept his Frodo 'Fro so we can still spot him in the crowd.

Ashlee Simpson

Formerly the ugly duckling younger sister of Jessica, when Ashlee Simpson wanted to make a name for herself she went for black hair and a rocker image on par with Avril Lavigne's brand of pseudo-tough girl ballsiness.

Two years after an embarrassing lip-syncing incident on Saturday Night Live, Ashlee Simpson entered her own version of the witness protection program, going under the knife. She emerged with a smaller nose, a chiseled chin and a few less pounds. Suddenly, she was the hot Simpson sister. Now married to rocker Pete Wentz, the couple welcomed their first child, son Bronx, in November 2008.

Nicole Richie

When we first met Nicole, she was Paris Hilton's chubby, formerly drug-addled sidekick.

But, reportedly under the tutelage of stylist Rachel Zoe, she was soon a lollipop girl, so thin even the paparazzi had to gasp. She dropped Zoe, ditched Paris, put on a few pounds and is now engaged to rocker Joel Madden, the father of the couple's two children. Fit, healthy, happy and overseeing her burgeoning fashion empire with House of Harlow, Nicole has never looked better.

Courtney Love

In the early 90s, Courtney Love just wanted to rock! In ripped baby doll dresses and slash of red lipstick, she was the Queen of the Grunge Scene. But, by 1997, with an Oscar nod for her role in The People versus Larry Flynt, Love stepped out onto the Academy Award red carpet, super glamified, with a perky new nose and trim hot body.

Unable to know when she'd had too much of a good thing, in recent years it seems that Love's addictive personality found a legal substitute: plastic surgery. Though in recent years, she claims she's sworn off the scalpel, she looks more and more like Mickey Rourke every time we see her. Maybe it's time for an intervention.

Heidi Montag

Poor Heidi Montag -- from a brow lift to liposuction (both totally unnecessary), the 23-year-old reality fame whore chose to undergo ten plastic surgical procedures in one day in what she calls her quest for perfection.

The Hills star already had a nose job and breast augmentation in 2007 but wanted to look even more like a real life Barbie doll. Over $30,000 in surgery later, she says she wants to have even more done and won't be satisfied until her bulging breasts hit an H cup ("For Heidi," she giggles moronically). We fear this girl's going to end up like that crazy Cat Face Lady or Anna Nicole Smith.

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