There’s a better movie in here somewhere beneath the bad editing and haphazard direction. Unfortunately, even that better movie can’t hold a candle to the movie I see in my head when I read the book. Which isn’t to say that I’m faulting the movie for diverging from the book. When it’s true to the book, it’s almost word-for-word, although many of the best jokes are inexplicably left out or glossed over. But, strangely, the movie is a lot better when it diverges from the book.
Even so, it’s not laugh-your-ass-off funny. It got some good chuckles and maybe a guffaw or two out of me. Zaphod was spot-on every time (the subtle George W. Bush impression was brilliant), and Arthur and Ford both had their moments; the former more often than the latter. Marvin was okay, but got little screen time. Slartibartfast was exactly how I’d imagined him. Deep Thought was even better than I’d imagined. And Trillian…well, Trillian was pretty much a one-dimensional character in the books, but she’s got a bit more depth here. I’m not sure if that’s good or bad.
Yet it felt like the actors were being stifled by the fact that the directors didn’t seem to know where to put the camera. I’ve seen some of Hammer and Tongs’ music videos, and they’re great, but Garth Jennings and Nick Goldsmith seem to be out of their element directing a dialogue-driven story. As if that’s not enough, the editor either didn’t know how to edit dialogue or he didn’t have enough footage to work with. The result is a movie that feels awkward and doesn’t flow right. The editor also makes one of the biggest mistakes you can make in a comedy: he doesn’t give the audience time to laugh. The result is that, when the occasional joke does draw laughter, it drowns out dialogue. And without hearing the dialogue, it’s pretty much impossible to know where the plot is going unless you’ve read the books, because the directors sure don’t give you much visual assistance.
In short, while I enjoyed it in spite of its shortcomings, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy isn’t quite the movie I had hoped it would be.
On the drive home from the theatre, as Felicity and I were discussing the movie, it occurred to me that there’s only one movie I can think of (not counting the HHGttG BBC series) that really captured the spirit of Douglas Adams’s books (without actually trying to): Mom and Dad Save the World.
Stop laughing, I’m serious.
Comments
Light Grenades
No, you're quite right. Mom and Dad Save the World is indeed a chip off the old Adams, even if it is painfully AMerican and painfully bad. It's still one of the funniest movies I've seen in the last year (which I actually saw on the big screen, courtesy of some Midwestern Ubergeeks. It's no, say, Lost Skeleton of Cadavera, but worth every painful minute.
I concur entirely.
Aurthur was good, slartibartfast was perfect and zaphrod was near perfect. Ford being a black man really fit his personality, but he just seemed too watered down.
One major loss was the modification of zaphrod's heads. They should have been side by side. I know they changed it to some kind of weird pop-out-of-the-neck thing because it would have been extremely difficult and tedious to make a character with two heads all the time, but this eliminated one of the funniest things that the book made me imagine. It would have been great to watch zaphrod's split personalities argue with each other and glare at each other and the like.
I started being dissappointed during the previews. It was a bunch of horrible kiddy crap that kindof got me out of the mood to watch anything, even the highly anticipated Hitchhiker's Guide.
It could have been great though, if it had been made by George Lucas in the seventies (before he started getting washed up).
It could have been a lot better if Aurthur was played by Tom Hanks, and Ford was played by Chris Tucker.
But as it is it wasn't a complete failure or anything, its just that it probably has no lasting appeal. This time next year nobody will know what movie you're talking about if you bring it up.