Let's be fair, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy had an awful lot to live up to.
It is based, of course, on the best-selling book of the same name by Douglas Adams, which has spawned numerous radio, TV and movie versions over the years and has legions of slavish and adoring fans.
Book-to-film adaptations are always risky, even at the best of times. But how much more so when expectations are running feverishly high?
I've never read Adam's beloved book. If I had, however, I suspect this particular movie version would've made me want to weep. Or at the very least, become very, very angry.
The problem with Hitchhiker isn’t that it's awful. If it was unrelentingly, jaw-droppingly bad, that might be forgivable. The real travesty is the way it takes its marvelous source material and proceeds to squander it. Messily. Like some great, bloated hemorrhaging colossus.
It had so much potential. There are glimpses of the quintessential English humour that I suspect makes the books so popular. When Arthur is trying to save his friend Trillian on the alien planet Vogosphere, for example, and is confronted by the excessive bureaucracy of the inhabitants, he says, "Leave this to me. I’m English. We invented standing in line."
And then there is the one genuinely funny character in the whole movie — the ship’s robot, Marvin the Paranoid Android. Marvin (voiced by the deliciously deadpan Alan Rickman) has a brain the size of a planet, but since he is seldom allowed to use it, he is habitually chronically depressed. He is prone to saying things like, "It gives me a headache just trying to think down to your level," and, "Wearily on I go, pain and misery my only companions. And vast intelligence, of course. And infinite sorrow. I despise you all."
Sadly, Marvin is not nearly enough to save this film. He is merely a respite from what becomes an increasingly frantic, shrill (and tedious) movie experience. Good actors and excellent material are simply wasted. Hitchhiker is trying to do so many things at once — fit in every whiz-bang idea and follow every single convoluted tangent of the book — that it ends up capsizing under the weight of its own cleverness.
Final verdict? Ouch. This is what happens when great ideas are whittled down to vapid, twittering stupidity. I was unable to watch until the end.
CORRECTIONS:LM
Article comments
1 - Nukapai
I completely disagree. But then again, I'm one of those slavish fans who actually read the book.
2 - kirsten
Well, fair enough. If anything, as bad as I thought the movie was, it's made me want to go read the book. Which is always a good thing. I could imagine becoming a slavish fan, myself...
3 - chris
How can you say that they've "squandered the source material" when you've never even seen the source material? Also, HG2TG went from radio show to book, and not the other way around.
4 - Chris
And, wait: you didn't even finish it?! We're not talking about "Evolution" here. May not be a gem, exactly, but it's certainly good enough to finish. Especially if, you know, you have to write a review of it.
5 - Tyler Newton
I've listened to the radio series, read the books, watch TV series, and this movie...and this movie sux. Sorry, but it's true.
Here is what a biographer of Douglas Adams had to say about the movie. You'll see how nonsensical it is:
or, if you want a spoiler-free version
OR a list of things in other versions not in the movie
6 - The Theory
There are several different forms of criticizing this movie... most i disagree with and a few I don't.
The opinions I disagree with...
"They left out such and such"
my reply- with a book as detailed and aimless as H2G2 it would be impossible to include everything... particularly when it comes to various jokes, of which everyone has their own favorites.
"they changed such and such about the story line"
my reply- if every medium of Hitchhiker's guide (radio series, book, tv mini-series, computer game... am i missing anything?) were compared, there would be countless changes and anomalies to the "standard" (which I will consider the book, since that is what most people are familiar with) plot. Douglas Adams seemed to actually pride himself on the inconsistancy.
"Hollywood added a lot of unnessisary stuff"
my reply- No. Before Adams died he had a basically complete copy of the script written. The main changes to the script after he died was some tightening up of dialogue... which could have been better left the way Adams wrote it (i won't argue that)... but most people look at the relationship stuff between Arthur and Trillian.. the trip to Vogsphere... and the trip to meet Humakavoola (or whatever that religious dude is) as being stuff not approved by Adams... however, they were very much his vision and a part of his script.
The criticisms I would agree have valid points are how the movie looks like it was filmed in three days... the movie just has a campy, grainy, uneven look to it. It doesn't look big budget. While on the one hand I agree with their idea of not doing big hollywood special effects (they would have been distracting and not in keeping with the whole H2G2 feel)... there would have been a better middle ground. Similarly, the acting feels stilted and like they just half arsed their way through most of it.
The plot to anyone not familiar with h2g2 prior to the movie would be non-sensical... even I as a big hitchhiker's fan had to watch it a couple of times to connect all of the dots.
Yet, despite all of that, there are some just simply amazing ideas presented in the movie. The opening credits scene with the dolphins is just great. When the improbability drive is used and everyone becomes yarn. "Ford, I feel like a sofa" is one of my favorite hitchhiker parts ever.
I loved many of the visual jokes... like when the earth gets blown up and the camera just keeps pulling back and back up and farther into space with the music... i tend to get a bit misty-eyed during that part. Or when Marvin gives Arthur a hand...
Plus, the nod to the TV series was great with the use of their theme song (which is actually an Eagles song).
It just seems to me that there are so many great little things that happen in the movie that it is worth suffering the rest just for them.
7 - Warren
"I've never read Adam's beloved book. If I had, however, I suspect this particular movie version would've made me want to weep. Or at the very least, become very, very angry."
Yes, it did.
8 - Tan The Man
One of the more entertaining films of the year, to say the least...