I'm seriously surprised that I'm the first one to post about this flick.
It came out Friday, which happened to be my birthday, so my wife and I made the two hour trek to the nearest theater to show it. I'm a big fan of Douglas Adams' books, but my wife had never read any of them.
We both enjoyed the film quite a bit.
The film starts with a very British narrator saying how humans were the 3rd smartest creature on earth and that dolphins were the second smartest. They had known about the demise of earth for some time and had been trying to warn us. We just interepreted their actions as cute tricks.
And then it turns into a dolphin musical with them singing "So Long And Thanks For All The Fish", which any fan should know.
The story then goes into Arthur Dent's plight, and him being taken from Earth by his alien friend Ford Prefect (Mos Def) before it's destruction by the Vogons. I was pleasently surprised by Mos Def's performance in the film. He certainly wouldn't have been my first choice, but he really got the film and played Ford perfectly. The Vogons are a blast as well, and I must applaud Jim Henson's creature shop for their amazing work with them.
The rest of the cast does quite well. Sam Rockwell is amazing as always as Zaphod and Zooey Daschenal is strangely sexy as Trillian. Then of course there is Alan Rickman as the manically depressed robot - Marvin.
I can't believe really how good this film was. It did deviate from the books somewhat but keeps the same humor and playfulness. I can honestly say it's one of the most fun films I've seen at the theater in quite awhile. Hopefully you'll be lucky like we were and be in a theater with a few other fans.
As I said, my wife has never read any of the books, but she did enjoy it quite a bit. She said that it was a drawback though since she didn't get many of the jokes. So, now she plans on reading the series.
When the film ended, I wanted to clap and shout but all I could do was walk out with a huge stupid grin on my face. If you've thought about seeing it, do so. It's fantastic!
I haven't seen the movie.
I actually just read a review of the movie over at cnn (http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/Movies/04/29/review.hitchhiker.ap/index.html) and what amused me is that everything in the review that they *didn't* like was actually exactly how I remembered the book.
QuoteDespite its quick, quirky opening and dry British wit, after a while "Hitchhiker's Guide" feels like an onslaught. There is simply too much stuff -- too many aliens, too many gadgets, too many elaborately absurd set pieces -- all at the expense of character development and plot.
Yeah, that sums up the books too. Fairly simply sketched and rather obvious personalities bouncing randomly through the universe in a constantly changing setting. That's part of what made the books work, a general feeling of "He's making this up as he goes", which in the case of the radio show, was very much the case.
Fearless Freep wrote:
> which in the case of the radio show, was very much
> the case.
I have to admit, I'm not up on the chronology, but didn't the radio show come first, THEN the book(s)? For a long time, I thought the books came first.
I loved the books, and the few eps of the TV series I've seen. I've never heard the radio show.
I've read mixed reviews about the movie (on /., which I know have to be taken with a grain of salt), and frankly, have not decided if I am going to try to see it in the theater. Skaboi's praise carries more weight than the others I've read. I just have to get past my "it won't be the books) preconceptions ...
"too many aliens, too many gadgets, too many elaborately absurd set pieces -- all at the expense of character development and plot."
What else can one expect from a SciFi-Comedy?
That´s like saying: "Oh, I didn´t like MiB because of the character developement." Just ridiculous...
Most of the bad reviews I've read have been from people who admittedtly don't like british humor and have never read the original work.
To be completely honest - this film was made by people who have a serious love of the works. It was cowritten by Douglas Adams before his death and by Kary(sp?) Kirkpatrick.
As I said, due to the fact that it's a movie, it's not completely on with the book but it's damned close.
My daughter saw it last night and loved it. She is a big Monty Python fan and thought the humor was similar.
The humour was definitely similar to Monty Python: absurd silliness, but I think this was a bit more mainstream humour I guess.
Also too many Aliens? The only real Aliens were the Vogons, there wasn't really much else in the way of crazy Alien lifeforms [and by not much, I mean non-human based ones] Any Sci-Fi fan would be able to keep up with that fact easily, especially since Star Wars had more variety...
Anyway...
I loved this film. I loved the silliness of it, I loved the stupid humour, I loved the effects [not that it really mattered] and I just really had an enjoyable time.
I never read or watched or heard any other Hitchhiker's guide stuff, but I did know about it, and generally what the deal was, so that wasn't really a hindrance to me.
One of the funniest moments in the movie for me actually didn't come from the movie itself: When the gang lands on the Vogon home planet and that crab is running along going 'yay' there was a brief silence, to which some girl behind me exclaimed loudly "This is stupid," she continued saying it a few more times, though generally being drowned out by peoples laughter.
I was especially happy that I saw it in a completely full theater. I generally find that watching comedies and silly movies like this are always better with a large audience: if the atmosphere is good then everyone has an even better time.
What really bugs me though is that one newspaper movie critic gave Hitchikers Guide 1 and a half stars, whilst XXX2 got 2 and a half. And people wonder why I never trust movie reviews...
, but didn't the radio show come first, THEN the book(s)?
Yes, the radio show came first; andDA was writing a lot of the radio episodes as they were recording, pretty much. That's why the earlier books have a very random, episodic feel; little short scenes bouncing along from adventure to adventure. Nothing really settled down into a cohesive plot until "Life, The Universe, and Everything". Trillian actually was showing some character development and Arthur had mostly just adapted to the universe happening to him. Zaphod, Ford, and Marvin never really had any character development; they just were who they were; personalities for Arthur's "stranger in a strange land" to bounce off of. I can't understand why a movie review would complain about a lack of character development, considering the source material had little.
I just have to get past my "it won't be the books) preconceptions ...
Especially in this case. HHGTTG has been in many media and never consistant from one to the next as Adams kept tweaking things.
I went to see this with 3 people who didn't read the books (I had, and am a HUGE Adams fan) and all 3 of them left confused. It was a bit dense for a 2 hour movie. I absolutely loved it, but I would have liked it even more if they stretched it out some. I hope it makes enough money to warrant a sequel in the Hollywood big-wigs' eyes. "Restaurant At the End of the Universe" would be a great movie as well. I'd even like to see the "Dirk Gently" books by Adams made into movies. I love them both.
Just a sidenote. . has anyone ever pictured the "Hitchhiker's" 5-book trilogy as an animated feature? I think the narratives lend themselves easily to animation. I wish the Pixar people could do something along those lines, but with the live-action one out already, it seems very unlikely.
Is it not a great joy to have a Sci Fi adaptation that is actually close to the source material in spirit if not 100% content?
I can just see Stephen King seeing it and saying "Dear god, FOLLOWING the book, what a concept!"
I'll let "I, Robot" remain in it's early grave.
Ed
I loved the hell out of it. My only complaint is that some of the jokes got a bit shortchanged because the movie was so dense (the most noticeable to me was when Ford distracted the foreman of the demo crew with beer instead of insane logic). I'll forgive it, though, because I assume it was to cover as much ground as possible in one flick in case it did badly and the studio refused to do another one. The theater I saw it in was not completely packed, but was plenty crowded. It was nice to see whole families, from grandparents to young children (who were all well-behaved!) come in, and all clearly have a good time and laugh at all the right parts. No ranting nerdboys talking overloudly about how certain things were wrong, no dumbass jocks and their dumbass cheerleader girlfriends, and most importantly of all, no goddamn cell phones. I'm sure this will do well enough to inspire the studio to pour more money into another installment, because as dense as this was, there's still a lot of material left to cover.
I don't know how people can complain about things that were different. Different from what, the previous three versions which were all different from each other anyway? The greatest thing about HGTTG is its adaptability. Now a whole new generation of fans will be led into it and be able to discover and love all the previous incarnations. Any critic who panned it as being too weird missed the boat big time. Idiots.
There were some nice callbacks to the miniseries as well, like using the original miniseries music over the revealing of the Guide itself for the first time, and the original Marvin standing in the queue on the Vogsphere.
When they fly in the Magrathea showroom in the little cart, Arthur's reaction is one of the most perfect things I've ever seen. He doesn't look awed, he doesn't look afraid, he puts his hand over his mouth and looks like he's about to cry. When I saw that, it just worked. I think that's how I'd react if I saw something like that.
The Vogons looked amazing, a great big "f**k you" to overuse of CGI. Rock on Hensen crew! The performances were all great, it looked beautiful, it was unrelentingly weird even in the more Hollywood-ified parts. Great great movie.
My usual ramblings.
Being something of an anorak, I am aware of the radio series, the books, the television series, but the film will be my first attempt to see it. Which I hope to see tomorrow, as I have the day off.
This was first conceived as a film over five years ago. Thus, that it was ever released is something of a surprise. That length of time between conception and release, usually means the film will never be made.
If I have any complaint about current British comedy, is that it is too staid; therefore, I am glad to see the film is going back to the earlier British comedy of Monty Python, the Goodies, the Two Ronnies, etc.
I know there was five books in the series. I don't know how many books this film covers, but I doubt it was all five; therefore, we are likely, with its success, to get one or more sequels to the film.
We'll have to see whether the film has what is known as "legs." The #1 film in the U.S. last weekend, we'll have to see how it does this weekend in competition with "Kingdom of Heaven," "House of Wax," "Crash," etc.
All right! I finally saw it, in the cinema tonight!
I was a bit confused in the beginning with all the dolphins splashing about in the starting credits, but the movie settles into a very biisk, breezy pace that makes the ending almost 'abrupt'. The 'feeling' of the books and TV show is retained to a large extent. Having different voices and actors from the originals is par for the course, so I accepted that, and I was VERY pleasantly surprised to see a number of elements from the books that never made it into the TV or radio show.
The movie script was pared down relative to the TV show and radio series by obvious necessity, and it still held together very nicely. Some of the special effects (like the Magrathea 'factory floor') were magnificent. The acting was cool, Zaphod was even more over the top than you'd expect, and John Malkovich was really quite disturbing in his small but powerful role.
VERY glad I decided to see this one in the cinema. Very glad.
~Archivist~
I got around to seeing it last night. I've read the book and saw part of the bbc tv series (didn't care for the actors). I have also read the unfavorable review by Adams' biographer but I also read many of the good reviews. That said, I liked this movie. Some of the jokes from the book didn't really work and some of the jokes were only half told leading me to wonder why they even bothered with them. Some of the non-book additions were really fun and I won't spoil them here. Fans of the book should see this movie, if for no other reason than it is an enjoyable departure from what one usually gets at the multiplex. There are even talking puppet objects a la the Young Ones and an appearance of the BBC tv show's original Marvin. I liked all the actors and even though some were concerned about Mos Def as Ford, he plays it with a great sort of "detachment" where Earth is concerned. He likes Arthur, but can't really understand his feelings for Earth and so offers well meaning hugs and pats on the knee but no real empathy. I also thought that pretty much everything was explained. I heard that some folks felt that certain parts were hard to follow, but I think for them seeing it again might answer those questions.
Blah blah blah...thumbs up.