Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
May 2, 11:41 PM—Micah Wylde
I am an avid Hitchhiker's fan. I have read the books, listened to both the initial two phases and the tertiary phase of the radio show more times than I can count, and have numerous times watched the BBC miniseries. I have enjoyed all of these rendition's of this universe. However, I loathed the movie. The jokes were removed, the characters destroyed, and the social commentary effaced. I accept the need to change aspects of the story to fit the new medium; Douglas himself morphed the plot between the different renditions. The movie, meanwhile, was bad, not just different. There never was much plot in Hitchhiker's. What was there was a thinly veiled excuse for the witty dialogue, and the brilliant characters. The movie has destroyed these two essential elements, and is thus left with only a nonsensical plot.
Many of the problems with this movie are displayed in the scene in which Prostetnic Vogon Gelz is reciting his abominable poetry to Arthur and Ford. After Arthur invents some poetic nonsense, Gelz asks him if he means that the Vogon captain writes poetry because he just wants to be loved. In the movie, this is where the scene cuts off. In the book, however, Gelz tells them, "That's completely wrong. I just write poetry to throw my mean, callous soul into harsh relief." That scene looses much of its comedic value because that one line was removed. Throughout the movie similar indiscriminate cutting occurs. It's as if the screenwriter had no idea what was funny and what was not. Most of the hilarious dialogue that made the earlier renditions was cut from this one.
The only lead who was cast as a British actor was Arthur Dent. This did not bode well for the character interpretations. The strong and wacky characters were always a strong part of the radio and television shows; however in this rendition they are destroyed. While Arthur Dent is played pitch-perfect by Freemen, the rest of the leads fail. Zaphod Beeblebrox is one of the worst offenders in this regard; he is played as a complete idiot, instead of as an incorrigible egotist, which leaves little room for development. Similarly, Trillian, instead of being the smart, sarcastic woman of the radio show, comes off as merely dippy. In addition, the whole romantic subplot between Trillian and Arthur destroys the last vestiges of hope for the movie.
The disparate renditions of Hitchhiker's are connected mostly by the air of Douglas' universe. This is missing from the movie. The sense that it is all a parody of earth is gone, and in place of it are some stupid subplots (most of which are along the lines of: go to this planet and get this thing for no reason, but we have to show off these cool effects somehow). The only reason I can imagine to account for this monstrosity (aside from sheer incompetence) is the reasoning that Americans cannot deal with real humour. P.T. Barnum famously said, "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the American public," and this truth is exhibited clearly in this regrettable film, as in the first weekend it grossed over $22 million, and was ranked first in the box office.
Seeing this movie wouldn't have been so painful if the source material hadn't been so good. Sure, it still would have been a lousy movie, but it wouldn't have hurt as much. And with a sequel in the making, I'd say that yes, now we can panic.
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