The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy

By Simon Woodhouse

Is nothing sacred? As far as Hollywood is concerned, the answer's no. If a film looks like it'll make money, it gets made. And if there's already a following out there, if the story exists in the form of a book, or a computer game, or a TV show, then all the better. Half the marketing has been done if the source material's already known and loved. And what's the worse that can happen? The film will be a flop and the studio will lose money. It's no biggie, it happens all the time. But there's more to it than that. If you make a film of a book, and the film is rubbish, it drags down the reputation of the book. Hollywood, however, doesn't care.

On paper, The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy looks as though it'd make a great film. It's a very visual book, with lots of detailed descriptions. The main character is an everyman type of bloke, someone we can all relate to. It's funny, very funny in fact, and it's already been a successful radio series and TV show. Bearing all this in mind, you'd imagine that someone would actually have to try very hard to turn it into a terrible movie.

Hitchhiker's tells the story of Arthur Dent (Martin Freeman), a very average English man. His life becomes very un-average when one day his house is demolished to make way for a bypass, and then his planet is demolished to make way for an even bigger bypass. But all is not lost. Unbeknownst to Arthur, his best friend, Ford Prefect (Mos Def), is an alien from a planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse. Because of this, Ford is able to save Arthur's life by getting him off the earth the moment before it's destroyed. This extraordinary event is the first step in Arthur's voyage around the galaxy. To help him understand what's happening, he's given a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy by Ford. A talking book (voiced by Stephen Fry), it offers helpful tips about life amongst the stars.

This opening section of the movie is very watch-able. Martin Freeman is not bad as Arthur, and Mos Def is pretty good as Ford (despite the fact he's very far removed from the character in the book). They have quite a good on-screen chemistry, and make an unlikely, but likeable, pair of heroes. Unfortunately, other characters don't fare so well.

An unlikely series of events sees Arthur and Ford end up on the Heart of Gold, the fastest ship in the galaxy. It's been stolen by the galactic president, Zaphod Beeblebrox (Sam Rockwell), as part of a plot that gets more and more complicated as the film rolls on. And this is one of the movie's many failings. Comedies don't really need plots. The funniest films can get by with micro thin storylines, because they're about jokes, not who did what to who, where and when. Hitchhiker's quickly becomes swamped by layers and layers of goings-on that smother the jokes.

Though Martin Freeman and Mos Def are good as Arthur and Ford, Sam Rockwell makes a terrible Zaphod. He's a generic character, the self-centred moron who's so often a staple of lesser comedies. There's also a bit too much in the way of a romantic subplot. Though the character of Trillian (Zooey Deschanel) appeared in the book, her involvement with Arthur was only fleeting. In the film, however, she's the driving force behind all his actions. Other key characters also seem to have been poorly rendered. Marvin the paranoid android (voiced by Alan Rickman) was an excellent character in the book, but in the film he's very under-used. Likewise, the Vogons have changed from loutish bullies into bureaucratic non-entities.

Anyway, the film stumbles along, lurching from one set piece to the next. The different set ups seem almost thrown together. It's as if the film makers didn't really know what to do with the CGI box of tricks they had at their disposal, and so went mad and included a bit of everything. John Malkovich puts in an appearance as Humma Kavula, a character whose presence only confuses the plot. The film tries to get back on track towards the end. Arthur, Ford, Zaphod and Trillian arrive at the legendary planet of Magrathea, and meet Slartibartfast (Bill Nighy). There's an attempt to explain the reason for everything that's happened to Arthur, but it's too little too late.

This really is a train-wreck of a movie. Even the narration by the voice of the book doesn't help to explain what's happening. To enjoy the film, it's better to switch off the part of your brain that wants to understand the plot, and just sit back and watch the special effects.

Part of a five volume series of books, Hitchhiker's the movie could have been the first of a whole collection of films. But let's hope not. Perhaps if the franchise is picked up by a different studio it could possibly be saved. As it is, however, I expect (and hope) this'll be the last chance Hollywood has of ruining such a beloved book.