USA 2005 - Adventure/Comedy/Sci-Fi — 110 min — Directed by Garth Jennings
Cast: Bill Bailey, Anna Chancellor, Warwick Davis, Mos Def, Zooey Deschanel, Su Elliot
Everyone has bad mornings. You wake up late, you stub your toe, you burn the toast...but for a man named Arthur Dent, this goes far beyond a bad day. When he learns that a friend of his is actually an alien with advanced knowledge of Earth's impending destruction, he is transported off the Earth seconds before it is exploded to make way for a new hyperspace motorway. And as if that's not enough, throw in being wanted by the police, Earth 2.0, an insane electronic encyclopedia, no tea whatsoever, a chronically depressed robot and the search for the meaning of life, and you've got the greatest adventure off Earth.
Oh. I never imagined it would be this bad, but it was. They totally botched it. They managed to make it totally boring and ultimately a dreadful movie. It was not a comedy, unless you mean a comedy of a comedy. They've tried before with TV and animated series and failed, and this just adds movie to the list. I smiled a few times - that's about it. No laughs. Not one. But that was to be expected I suppose. It shows that not every book can be filmed, and done well by it. So where did it go wrong? Well, I'd say by turning it into a love story and a space opera - both which the book isn't.
The Vogons were great, but everything else was wrong. Zaphod was cool - for a solid minute or two, but he was then turned into a meaningless sidekick. He's a sidekick to no one! Ask him. Worst of all is that when they introduced stuff, they just whisked past it without developing the essence of it, if you will, not giving it more explanation than a brief intro. Examples: You don't get to know that the Heart of Gold ship's computer is an insane, but very happy and optimistic computer. That Zaphod treat Arthur like, Arthur the Ape man. Trillian and Arthur is not a couple. And worst of all - Zaphod's second head. Agh! They totally fucked that one up! Sure they could have done better if the movie was one hour longer, but still, they screwed some major stuff up, and that's unforgivable. Just think if Peter Jackson had let Boromir survive and marry Galadriel...
My rating: 3 / 10
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