Zany, Crazy, (slightly) Over-long, but Brilliant

adam1981

I'll start by letting you know where I stand on the "trilogy" (there's actually six) of books: I think that Douglas Adams is possibly one of the most perceptive minds of our time, and his command of English, the way he turns metaphor on it's ear and such, amazes and delights me each time I read his work. Example: "The giant yellow constructor fleet ship, the size of many city blocks, hung in the air precisely the way bricks don't." Love that line...

Anyway, the mini is a mixed bag of sorts. I agree with the comment many here have made that the only thing that really, truly bugs me about it is that they got Trillian all wrong, (don't get me wrong, she's not played as a complete moron, just a little ditzier than I imagined her, and the hair is, as has been pointed out, entirely the wrong shade of black; [it's blonde]). But I find it laughable that people see fit to completely trash the entire movie based on one bad bit of casting, and a low effects budget. Don't give me wrong, I would have loved to see a more modern, high-budget feature film made, but I don't see that happening now that Douglas Adams is dead.But the story never has been about technology (at least not much), it's strength lies in the dialogue and plot, which are just as strong in the movie as they are in the book. (Perhaps I should say books, because the series covers the first two and a bit of the third.) People giving the actors hell is also completely unfair in my opinion, because they are playing very verbose characters whose lines are taken almost directly out of the books. As any actor knows, becoming a literary character is difficult. I think that both Simon Jones and David Dixon were wonderful as the two main characters, Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect, and Mark Wing-Davey (Zaphod) acts as well as anyone with a rubber head glued to his shoulder and a silly prosthetic third arm could hope to. The voice of the book, while not what I imagined, is also very nice, and the way that the passages from the book are presented (with silly and colorful graphics illustrating the points of each entry) is quite effective.

I have seen this probably more times than I've read the books, and I still enjoy it each time. (Actually, I think I wore my old tape out. Good thing it's available on DVD now...)    :)

/ah

score 9/10

adam1981 16 July 2003

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw0181960/