Because there just aren't enough movie reviews on the web already... Episode III
Other Most Disappointing Movie of 2005: The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy
After some twenty years in development hell - and four years after Douglas Adams' sadly premature departure from this world - The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy finally made it to the big screen.
I really wanted to love this film, I really did. I was not going to be one of those hardcore fanboys who would be horribly upset at every little deviation from the novels that I love so much; after all, the novels deviated quite a bit from the original radio series - the plot to Hitchhiker's has been nothing but maleable over the years.
Early statements and reports from the filmmakers demonstrated that everybody involved was in love with Adams' creation and wanted to remain as faithful to the spirit of his work as possible without sacrificing too much to Hollywood conventions.
The resulting film was, indeed, different from the novels and the radio series. I didn't mind that Ford Prefect was played by an American; I didn't mind the way that Zaphod's secod head was realised; I didn't mind the new plot strands and characters that were introduced. And the whole thing looked fantastic.
But the film didn't work.
The charm of Douglas Adams' writing is in the tangental ramblings, the imaginative and absurd linguistic riffs. That is a difficult thing to translate to a two hour movie. Obviously, a lot of material would have to be ditched but instead of picking a handful of the best bits and letting them play out in full, the filmmakers picked lots of bits and severely truncated them. The conversation with Prosser as Arthur Dent lies in front of the bulldozers at the start, the explanation about Babel fish... many of these classic scenes were present but horribly cut short.
The pacing was too fast. The gags did not have the time to breath. The actors' performances suffered because they were trying to get through the dialogue as quickly as possible so that they could get to the next scene. The whole thing needed to be taken down a gear.
And the romance between Arthur and Trillian? I was ambivalent about that. On the one hand, it was understated and not too schmaltzy but, on the other, the whole point about Arthur Dent is that he has lost his home and is hopelessly out of his depth in the wider universe. Baffled, confused, frustrated, anxious: Arthur Dent is a loser, an essentially nice man who is embittered by the more exciting and dynamic people who succeed where he fails. And for him to decide that he doesn't actually need to return to that mostly harmless little blue/green planet simply goes against every incarnation of the character that has gone before.
In fact, Arthur Dent as portrayed my Martin Freeman doesn't leave much of an impression at all. He sort of bumbles around looking surprised and a bit confused and... that's about it. The banter between him and Ford that was central to previous versions of Hitchhiker's is almost entirely absent. Many people criticised Mos Def's performance as Ford but I think he could have been fine if he had had the opportunity to take more time over delivering his lines. Even the usually faultless Bill Nighy - the perfect actor to portray Slartibartfast, you would have thought - gave a rather flat peformance.
There are some fine moments: Arthur's reaction to the spectacular planet factory is genuinely affecting and real; Stephen Fry was the perfect choice as the voice of The Guide; the graphics that accompany the Guide entries are simple, inventive and very funny; Bill Bailey as the voice of the whale; the "So Long And Thanks For All The Fish" song.
All the ingredients were there for a great adaptation but, despite the obvious love that went into the making of the film, they botched it.
After some twenty years in development hell - and four years after Douglas Adams' sadly premature departure from this world - The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy finally made it to the big screen.
I really wanted to love this film, I really did. I was not going to be one of those hardcore fanboys who would be horribly upset at every little deviation from the novels that I love so much; after all, the novels deviated quite a bit from the original radio series - the plot to Hitchhiker's has been nothing but maleable over the years.
Early statements and reports from the filmmakers demonstrated that everybody involved was in love with Adams' creation and wanted to remain as faithful to the spirit of his work as possible without sacrificing too much to Hollywood conventions.
The resulting film was, indeed, different from the novels and the radio series. I didn't mind that Ford Prefect was played by an American; I didn't mind the way that Zaphod's secod head was realised; I didn't mind the new plot strands and characters that were introduced. And the whole thing looked fantastic.
But the film didn't work.
The charm of Douglas Adams' writing is in the tangental ramblings, the imaginative and absurd linguistic riffs. That is a difficult thing to translate to a two hour movie. Obviously, a lot of material would have to be ditched but instead of picking a handful of the best bits and letting them play out in full, the filmmakers picked lots of bits and severely truncated them. The conversation with Prosser as Arthur Dent lies in front of the bulldozers at the start, the explanation about Babel fish... many of these classic scenes were present but horribly cut short.
The pacing was too fast. The gags did not have the time to breath. The actors' performances suffered because they were trying to get through the dialogue as quickly as possible so that they could get to the next scene. The whole thing needed to be taken down a gear.
And the romance between Arthur and Trillian? I was ambivalent about that. On the one hand, it was understated and not too schmaltzy but, on the other, the whole point about Arthur Dent is that he has lost his home and is hopelessly out of his depth in the wider universe. Baffled, confused, frustrated, anxious: Arthur Dent is a loser, an essentially nice man who is embittered by the more exciting and dynamic people who succeed where he fails. And for him to decide that he doesn't actually need to return to that mostly harmless little blue/green planet simply goes against every incarnation of the character that has gone before.
In fact, Arthur Dent as portrayed my Martin Freeman doesn't leave much of an impression at all. He sort of bumbles around looking surprised and a bit confused and... that's about it. The banter between him and Ford that was central to previous versions of Hitchhiker's is almost entirely absent. Many people criticised Mos Def's performance as Ford but I think he could have been fine if he had had the opportunity to take more time over delivering his lines. Even the usually faultless Bill Nighy - the perfect actor to portray Slartibartfast, you would have thought - gave a rather flat peformance.
There are some fine moments: Arthur's reaction to the spectacular planet factory is genuinely affecting and real; Stephen Fry was the perfect choice as the voice of The Guide; the graphics that accompany the Guide entries are simple, inventive and very funny; Bill Bailey as the voice of the whale; the "So Long And Thanks For All The Fish" song.
All the ingredients were there for a great adaptation but, despite the obvious love that went into the making of the film, they botched it.
posted by Steve Kane at 3:06 PM
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