The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Review by Richard Lee

Touchstone (Buena Vista) / 2005 / 109 Minutes / Rated PG
Street Date: September 13, 2005

Specifications:
-DVD-Video
-DVD-9
-Region 1

Aspect Ratio:
-2.35:1 Anamorphic Widescreen

Audio:
-English
-English DTS
-French
-Spanish

Subtitles:
-English for the Hearing Impaired
-French
-Spanish
-None

Main Menu:
-Play Movie
-Scene Selection
-Bonus Features
-Set Up
-Sneak Peeks
-Improbability Drive

Bonus Features:
-Making of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (9 Minutes)
-Additional Guide Entry
-Deleted Scenes
-Really Deleted Scenes
-Sing Along “So Long & Thanks for All the Fish”
-Audio Commentaries
-Marvin’s Hangman

Based on the books by the late Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker has seen several incarnations; first, a radio series in England, then a TV miniseries on BBC; even a videogame. But for over 20 years, Adams had struggled to get a motion picture of his creation made and sadly, he did survive to see this dream realized due to a heart attack during production. What we do get is a somewhat faithful approach to Adams’ books where the basic premise remains the same, as well as the quirky spirit, but takes a couple of detours of its own. Another matter to take note of is that this film’s humor is decidedly British, as was its author. American audiences will mostly not get the comedic moments because it is not blatantly struck about their heads like a sledgehammer; moreover, this is more like Monty Python where the humor is smart, sardonic, and mainly subtle. That said, only the folks who are familiar with Adams’ work or British humor in general will enjoy this curio scf-fi flick; others, beware.

After an amusing opening act with singing dolphins, the story begins when Arthur Dent, an everyman figure somewhere in England, learns that his home is scheduled to be demolished to make way for a super-highway. However, unbeknownst to Arthur and everyone else on the planet, Earth itself is scheduled for obliteration to make way for an inter-stellar hyperspace expressway. Luckily for Arthur, his friend Ford Prefect, who happens to be an alien, takes him and hitches a ride on one of the demolition ships just before the Earth is destroyed. Arthur’s travels have him encountering a myriad of strange and interesting characters starting with Zaphod Beeblebrox, a fugitive inter-galactic president, who is a cross between a politician and a rock star and has three arms and two heads. Zaphod is accompanied by Trillian, a human female who also escaped Earth’s destruction and whom Arthur once met at a party; and Marvin, a depressed robot who resembles Charlie Brown in mechanical form. To make sense of what is sure to be confusing to most, I’ll attempt to condense the plot as much as I can. Zaphod is on the run for stealing a ship called the Heart of Gold; this ship transforms matter as it hyper-traverses the universe. With this ship, Z and his crew go to settle a score with a political rival of his, Humma Kavula, a religious cult leader with eyes in his glasses rather than in his sockets and tiny mechanized pods for the lower half of his body. Unfortunately, circumstances do not fall in their favor and Humma ends up holding one of Z’s heads for collateral while our heroes have to retrieve a weapon called The Point of View Gun that causes the victim to spew out the shooter’s point of view, hence the name. All the while the inter-galactic police are hot on their trail and there’s something about pursuing the answer to THE question of the universe. Add to this lots and lots of side-story vignettes and aliens provided by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop and you have Hitchhiker in a nutshell.
Cast as Arthur is Martin Freeman, who some will remember from the BBC’s version of The Office. Zaphod Beeblebrox is played with an over-the-top performance from Galaxy Quest’s Sam Rockwell. Ford Prefect is played by hip-hop’s Mos Def while Marvin the Robot is voiced by Die Hard’s Alan Rickman but embodied by Willow’s Warwick Davis. Trillian is played by Almost Famous and Elf’s Zooey Daschanel and Humma is played with an all too brief appearance by John Malkovich, whom Adams had created this character especially for. Although the look of this production reeks of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, the director and producer of Hitchhiker were previously only known for music videos; Garth Jennings and Nick Goldsmith have done videos for R.E.M. and Blur and this being their first motion picture, it is quite an impressive debut indeed. Though Adams had worked on the screenplay, it is a real shame he didn’t live to see the completed product; reminiscent of Carl Sagan, who died during the production of “Contact”. In the end, I believe little nuances missed during the first viewing of Hitchhiker will be picked up during repeated viewings and therefore requires multiple viewings to appreciate it more.

Picture Quality:

Presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen, the picture is, on the whole, clear and adequately detailed. There is some evidence of graininess, particularly in the broad solid colors during the interludes when chapters of the Hitchhiker’s Guide is expounded upon; more space on the disc should have been devoted to the video quality, especially since there is frequent wide vista shots of planetary landscapes and multitudes of the populace therein. Art direction and production design are top notch for a film of this nature and as mentioned before, it reminds me of the look of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil (Gilliam had been approached to direct but turned it down). Interiors range from dirty, dingy, and grimy on the Vogon demolition ships to the sterilized-white on board The Heart of Gold. Blacks are solid with good contrasting; a decent transfer but could have been better.

Audio Quality:

5.1 dolby digital as well as DTS is provided and although the DTS has the sonic edge, there are a few seconds of dropouts that the DTS track contains that the DD track does not – (23:15) when Vogons should be heard speaking from the rear channels. Otherwise, the surround effects are vast and completely enveloping, with everything from doors that sigh as one passes through to laser shootouts, spaceships landing and crashing, snowy blizzards blowing all around you to a bowl of petunias shattering on the ground somewhere behind you; directionality is well-defined. Narration is provided by the very British sounding Stephen Fry but is a perfect choice for bringing across that Monty Pythonesque feel to the tone of the film. The music score is orchestral and well-suited for a sci-fi fantasy adventure. 

Scenes for Demonstration Purposes:

1. (12:55) – Destruction of Planet Earth. 2. (53:00) – Escape from Planet Viltvodle. 3. (71:20) – Magrathean Missile Attack. 4. (81:20) – Trip Through the Planet Factory. 5. (95:30) – Showdown with the Vogons.

Bonus Features:

There are two commentaries, the first with director Garth Jennings, producer Nick Goldsmith and actors Martin Freeman and Bill Nighy. Definitely amicable in nature, this is the more amusing and enjoyable of the two commentaries, the other provided by executive producer Robbie Stamp and Douglas Adams’ colleague Sean Solle who go into more of the production behind the movie and the original source material and its author. 

The Making-Of featurette clocks in just under nine minutes with the director talking about the daunting task of adapting such a well known literary work to the big screen. We see brief interviews with some of the cast members most notably Warwick Davis whose face is never seen inside the robotic exterior of Marvin. “Additional Guide Entry” is an entry not covered in the movie; it discusses the origins of the Babelfish and its relation to God. “Deleted Scenes” of which there are three cover Arthur and Ford talking about the Earth, some Vogons singing while they work, and a little more explanation behind the relationship between Zaphod and the Vice President. “Really Deleted Scenes” play out more like intentional bloopers with the first one more humorous than the second. “Marvin’s Hangman” is a simple interactive game where you need to guess a four-letter word or witness Marvin being dis-assembled limb from limb while he utters lines from the movie. The “Improbability Drive” randomly takes you to various parts of the DVD, be it one of the bonus features or a short scene from the movie. Lastly, the “Sneak Peeks” which can be viewed at start-up or via the menu include Jodie Foster’s Flightplan, The Chronicles of Narnia, Dark Water with Jennifer Connelly, and ABC-TV’s series “Lost”. Other trailers include Aliens of t