"Hitchhiker's..." Reviews

Len Lanetti

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April 29, 2005

MOVIE REVIEW | 'THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY'


The Way the World Ends, With a Shrug and a Smile

[size=-1]By MANOHLA DARGIS [/size]


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n the hugely likable, long-awaited film of Douglas Adams's "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," the world comes to an end not just with a bang, but also with something of a shrug. It isn't that Arthur Dent, the hero of our charmingly bent story, has no feelings for this cursed plot, this Earth. But being English - and played by Martin Freeman, the lovesick sales representative from the original British television series "The Office" - he generally faces even the most perilous bumps during his intragalactic tour with a degree of resignation. On one occasion, though, he does steady himself with a cup of tea.

Dent, it happens, has been saved from extinction by his alien buddy Ford Prefect (Mos Def), a smooth operator in a snow-white suit who fends off trouble with an ordinary bath towel and knows how to hitch rides on passing spaceships. Arthur and Ford initially land on such a ship, operated by the Vogons, an unpleasant race that constitute the bulk of the galaxy's bureaucracy and come equipped with expansive girths and lumpy porcine faces with smushed-in snouts. Beautifully constructed by the Jim Henson Creature Shop with an attention to expressive detail that recalls the political caricatures of Honoré Daumier, the Vogons function as the villains in this tale, though it is a measure of Adams's dry, gentle humor that the creatures' most devastating weapon is their exceptionally bad poetry.

Adams's ever-expanding "Hitchhiker" universe began in 1978 as a BBC radio series that went on to spawn a novel, still more radio episodes, albums, a television series, four more novels (the author called the books "a trilogy in five parts"), a stage play, comics and a computer game. For years, Adams and various would-be collaborators tried to add a movie to this list, but only after the writer died of a heart attack in May 2001 at age 49 did the project start to take real shape. Among the directors approached was Spike Jonze, an inspired choice given that all his films feel as if they take place on another planet. He demurred, but recommended two British music video and commercial directors who work under the impossibly severe name Hammer and Tongs.

Hammer and Tongs are actually Garth Jennings, who directed "Hitchhiker," and Nick Goldsmith, who served as one of the film's producers. Given their work's breezy mixture of high and low tech, geek-chic style and lightly skewed humor - their "Coffee and TV" music video for Blur features a walking, waving and smiling cartoon milk carton - it's easy to see why these unknowns received the nod (I suspect they were also comparatively cheap to hire). Like the other cinematic post-ironists, whose brightest lights include Mr. Jonze and another music director turned feature filmmaker, Michel Gondry ("Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"), Mr. Jennings and Mr. Goldsmith have held onto a genuine sense of childlike wonder, which works as a nice corrective to what might otherwise come across as an overabundance of hip.

Artless, casually knowing and deeply goofy, the first "Hitchhiker" book may have been hip at one time, but what stands out today is just how much Adams seemed to have been enjoying himself. (It is a condition of hip never to admit to be having a good time.) The novel is zany, but its humor is remarkably unstrained and, for the most part, the same goes for the movie. "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," the name of the travel book Ford lends Arthur and which furnishes loads of practical information about the universe, has on its cover the legend "Don't panic." Mr. Jennings seems to have absorbed this sound advice. His filmmaking style is unrushed and - for a film stuffed with special effects - not overly busy, notwithstanding the Japanese schoolgirl with five torsos and one pair of knee-socked legs.

The hydra-headed schoolgirl pops up on a foggy planet, where Arthur, Ford and two other space travelers - an easygoing Earth girl with the moniker Trillian (Zooey Deschanel) and the president of the galaxy, Zaphod Beeblebrox (a sensational Sam Rockwell, riffing on Elvis and the current President Bush) - drop by for an atmospheric visit. This brief sojourn, which builds on a bit lifted from the second "Hitchhiker" book, doesn't really serve the plot, which is a relief, given that plot isn't the point. (The point of this particular episode is a patently freaky turn by John Malkovich.) The screenwriter Karey Kirkpatrick, who shares credit with Adams, has written that the novelist admitted that his first book is a story with "a long beginning and then an ending." The same is more or less true of the movie.

This narrative bagginess is partly what makes the film feel true to Adams, if not in precise letter then certainly in mellow spirit. One of the pleasures of this loopy adventure - along with its gloriously singing dolphins and knit puppets - is that what keeps the story in gear are the moments when its four space trekkers - and Marvin, the depressed robot mellifluously voiced by Alan Rickman - are chattering about all manner of cheery nonsense. In the years since "Blade Runner" cast its long dark shadow, most science-fiction cinema has set a course for dystopia. When he blew up the planet in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," Douglas Adams knew that despite everything, there were a few things about human beings worth keeping - friendship, laughter and, of course, those exceedingly useful opposable thumbs.

"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" is rated PG (Parental guidance suggested). It has gentle scares, fantastical monsters and some zap gun action.

'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'

Opens nationwide today.

Directed by Garth Jennings; written by Douglas Adams and Karey Kirkpatrick, based on the book by Mr. Adams; director of photography, Igor Jadue-Lillo; edited by Niven Howie; music by Joby Talbot; production designer, Joel Collins; produced by Gary Barber, Roger Birnbaum, Nick Goldsmith, Jay Roach and Jonathan Glickman; released by Touchstone Pictures and Spyglass Entertainment. Running time: 103 minutes. This film is rated PG.

WITH: Sam Rockwell (Zaphod Beeblebrox), Mos Def (Ford Prefect), Zooey Deschanel (Trillian), Martin Freeman (Arthur Dent), Bill Nighy (Slartibartfast), Warwick Davis (Marvin), Anna Chancellor (Questular), Alan Rickman (voice of Marvin), Helen Mirren (voice of Deep Thought), Stephen Fry (Narrator), Thomas Lennon (voice of Eddie the Computer) and John Malkovich (Humma Kavula).




Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company | Home | Privacy Policy | Search | Corrections | RSS | Help | Back to Top
 
04/29/2005
An overstuffed version of a beloved sci-fi book CHRISTY LEMIRE
Surely "The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy" would seem sufficiently well-known and have a large enough cult following for its various incarnations that comparing it to something else -- another book, another TV series, another movie, whatever -- would be pointless. You know it or you don’t. You love it or you don’t.

But sitting through the long-awaited film version of Douglas Adams’ beloved book calls to mind another ambitious effort: not Monty Python, with which it’s easy to find similarities, but last year’s "I (Heart) Huckabees."


Both have eclectic ensemble casts. Both mix complicated concepts with broad physical comedy. Both have the courage to be completely out there with wild ideas and images.

Despite 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.

The first film from longtime music video director Garth Jennings has traveled to the screen with lots of baggage. Adams died in 2001 at 49 while working (and re-working) on the screenplay; the script is credited to him and Karey Kirkpatrick.

What they’ve come up with sporadically flirts with genius -- like the guide itself, a precursor to the Blackberry with its bright colors and oversimplified graphics, the contents of which are explained in understated fashion by narrator Stephen Fry. Alan Rickman, meanwhile, provides the ideally droll voice of Marvin the Paranoid Android.

Most everything else, though, feels aimless and a little empty as the characters meander from one section of the galaxy to the next, their adventures punctuated by an overly jaunty score.

We don’t know that much about everyman hero Arthur Dent (Martin Freeman, Tim from the BBC series "The Office") or Tricia McMillan (the irrepressibly lovely Zooey Deschanel), the American girl he adores and with whom he unexpectedly reunites in space after the Earth blows up. Who they are doesn’t seem to matter as much as the places they inhabit, which are invariably over-the-top in detail. By no fault of their own, they’re like props with a pulse.

Mos Def has a goofy likability as Arthur’s friend, the automotively named (and nattily dressed) Ford Prefect, who informs Martin that he’s an alien just minutes before the globe is about to explode. And Bill Nighy ("Love Actually"), who stands out in every film he’s in with his craggy face and world-weary presence, plays a planetary construction engineer who offers such meaningful nuggets as, "I’d much rather be happy than right any day."

And then there’s Sam Rockwell, playing the incompetent galactic president, Zaphod Beeblebrox, in a way Adams couldn’t have imagined back in 1978. Rockwell is doing an impression of President Bush -- or he’s doing an impression of a parody of Bush, with his breezy jokes and smug twang -- but he’s dressed like the lead singer of a ‘70s glam-rock band.

This is a fascinating juxtaposition to behold, and it would have been the film’s best performance if Rockwell weren’t saddled with a repetitive, distracting special effect in which a second head pops out of his neck and starts talking.

It’s just one more element that makes the movie, similar to how the universe is described, "vastly, hugely, mindbogglingly big." But sometimes, size doesn’t matter.

Rated PG.

©Daily Local News 2005
 
Just saw it....

If you haven't read the book then READ THE BOOK FIRST. Reading the book was far more enjoyable then watching the movie. Not that the movie was bad, but it just lacked the pure enjoyment of the book. Quick frankly I found the movie rather boring.

If you're a Bush fan you might find it a little offensive. The take a few subtle swipes at Bush.
 
Roger Ebert says if you don't know the story form the book, you won't learn it from the movie...and amazingly, he hasn't read the books.
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050428/REVIEWS/50413005

Note that he gets the story wrong. Ford Prefect's house is destroyed to make way a for highway bypass. "The plans have been on on display at the town hall for weeks. I can't be blamed if you can't take an interest in civic affairs."

The earth is destroyed minutes later to make way for a galactic superhighway bypass. "The plans have been on on display on Alpha-Centauri for weeks. I can't be blamed if you can't take an interest in civic affairs."

Too bad. I gotta see it. I'm sure Jann will be bewildered. Maybe I'll show her the BBC TV show version first.

BTW, didja know you can play the Infocom game online? :dance:
http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/infocom.php

You have
no tea.
>
 
42



Now what was the question again? :D

If you haven't read the book, go read it... I've got Sue reading the trilogy (in five parts of course) now, before I take her to the movie. She's loving it so far... :)
 
I saw it yesterday. I loved it but my wife just shook her head. She didn't read the book first. So, now she is doing so. Hope she likes it.

Brent
 
mikea said:
Roger Ebert says if you don't know the story form the book, you won't learn it from the movie...and amazingly, he hasn't read the books.
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050428/REVIEWS/50413005

...

Too bad. I gotta see it. I'm sure Jann will be bewildered. Maybe I'll show her the BBC TV show version first.

...


Jann and I caught HHGTG yesterday. She loved it. Before we went I gave a her a short briefing on the opening and I showed her Marvin from the web site and she laughed out loud.

I thought it was great. It's not laugh a minute but a lot of good movies aren't either. Think "The Terminal", "Forrest Gump".

She says she wasn't lost on what was going on.

I just saw the Ebert/ Roper review where they both gave it a thumbs down. I guess they're right in that the problem is that everybody involved was a Douglas Adams fan so they couldn't look at it from the outside, newbie point of view.

I think they screwed up the editing where they managed to snip good jokes in half for no reason. There are setups when the punch line is not there. I could see the hand of the Disney suits telling them to increase the pace.

There's a reason why Ford is stuffing himself with beer and peanuts at the end of the world. They never say it.

The plans for the destruction of Arthur Dent's house were on file at the town hall:
In the basement...
in a former lavatory...
hidden in an old filing cabinet...
in a dark room... .
behind a sign which read, "Mind the tiger."

In the movie he mentions the basement. That's it. :(

I think the Jim Henson shop characters are amazing. Warwick Davis does yeoman job as Marvin.

Deep Thought has an Apple logo. Marvin from the BBC TV series is there. See? Too many inside jokes.

There's a sing along of "So Long and Thanks for all the Fish" on the web site. I think it's funny and catchy, buy maybe they needed to put the sing along in the sequence in the movie so the audience could make out the words. Look for that to be the only Oscar nomination, unless they get one for special effects. E&R say the effects stink. I didn't think so.

They are obviously setting up to do the sequel, "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe" I hope this one makes enough money that they get a chance to make the sequel and fix those problems.
 
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Just saw it this afternoon...

... hmm ...

I think the first half was great, it was really on a roll, then they just didn't seem to know what to do with it...

I agree, too many setups, not enough follow through... Interesting how they changed the ending, but fair enough, book to movie does that...

It was nice, but not "blow me out of the water" nice... *shrug*
 
Just got to see it last night. I thought it was pretty good, I'd give it a B+. I read the books a long time ago, around when they first came out. I thought about reading it again before seeing the movie, but figured I would be less critical of the movie if I didn't refresh myself on the details.

I went with three "Hitchikers" novices, including a 15yr old kid who is pretty into sci-fi. They all enjoyed it. The "So long, and thanks for all the fish" theme song is a hoot! (but now I need to get it out of my wife's head - she's a marine biologist by training...)

Jim Henson's shop did a great job with the alien critters - some of the best stuff since the bar scene in the original Star Wars. "CG" aliens just don't get me into the story as well.

My only real beef was that some of the dialogue was hard to understand (yes, I did put a Babel Fish in my ear before watching :p), but that could have been an artifact of the theater's sound system, but maybe the sound mixing could have been better.

What was most fun for me was seeing how my own imagination/visualization of the book was turned into a movie. And Alan Richman really nailed Marvin!

Jeff
 
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