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Hitchhiker's Guide Film Reports 518

Posted by CmdrTaco from the it's-coming-people dept.
wakaranai writes "The BBC reports that the new "The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" movie will star Martin Freeman (Tim from The Office) as Arthur Dent. According to the Internet Movie Database filming starts early 2004, and Marvin's voice will be Stephen Moore, reviving his role from the classic 1981 BBC TV version." If you haven't seen The Office, it takes the subject matter Dilbert has bored us with, and makes it utterly hysterical. This is a good bit of casting. I'm still available to play Zaphod.
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Hitchhiker's Guide Film Reports More

Hitchhiker's Guide Film Reports

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  • So, Taco . . . (Score:4, Funny)

    by GnrlFajita ( 732246 ) <brad@thewillar d s .us> on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:09AM (#7962454) Homepage
    . . . are you saying that you're a two-headed alien, or just look like one?

  • Word twisting (Score:5, Interesting)

    by andyrut ( 300890 ) * on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:10AM (#7962459) Homepage Journal
    A film version of Hitchhiker's may be interesting, but I think it's safe to say that a film simply cannot pick up on the wordplay of Douglas Adams. Adams is simply a master of twisting words that can make the reader laugh out loud.

    Unless the director chooses to use lots of narration, which could ruin a film.

    • Re:Word twisting (Score:5, Informative)

      by Threni ( 635302 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:12AM (#7962474)
      > A film version of Hitchhiker's may be interesting, but I think it's safe to say > that a film simply cannot pick up on the wordplay of Douglas Adams.

      Given that the original was a radio show, which contained one or two words....

      • Re:Word twisting (Score:4, Insightful)

        by andyrut ( 300890 ) * on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:23AM (#7962590) Homepage Journal
        Given that the original was a radio show, which contained one or two words....

        With radio, the audience isn't shown what's going on, thus there has to be a certain degree of narration to give them some idea of what's going on.

        With a movie, the audience sees the action for themselves so narration wouldn't have to be used.

        • Re:Word twisting (Score:2, Interesting)

          by mirko ( 198274 )
          With a movie, the audience sees the action for themselves so narration wouldn't have to be used.

          You may achieve excellent results using narration in a movie, one of my favourite situations is the one where Don Lockwood explains is idea of "Dignity" [imdb.com].

          • Re:Word twisting (Score:2, Insightful)

            by trellick ( 67244 )

            Ah and don't forget the 'Blade Runner' narration - (the original - not the awful Director's Cut). Harrison Ford's voiceover added tremendously to the overall film.

            I just the original would be put on DVD.

            "Dear Mr Scott, please please please change your mind..."

        • Noir it up, beeyatch. (Score:5, Interesting)

          by fenix down ( 206580 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:41AM (#7962774)
          Blade Runner-style, g.

          Instead of a narrator, you just have the Guide chip in with an internal monologue every once and awhile. That's what Fight Club did to keep all their clever wordplay in. Admittedly, they had it easier since FC's first-person to start with, but most of the good stuff in H2G2 is cleverly-worded exposition, so it's no problem to just have the Guide say most of it.

          • Fitting, actually... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by ackthpt ( 218170 ) * on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @11:35AM (#7963371) Homepage Journal
            It would be fitting to noir it up a bit, as it really is a very cynical work. When I read H2G2 back in the early 80's I thought it was a stitch. The last time I read it, about 1995, I realized it was cynical and very biting, though appears humorous and whimsical on the surface. What DNA was saying about things though his characters and story line is unfortunately true enough about Britain if not other parts of the world, the USA prominently included. Sirius Cybernetics == Microsoft? That would have been some foresight, but that SC would be some company or companies was inspired by something.

            Read the books again and look beyond the humor. It's probably only the humor which will appear on the screen, which could be a bit of a let down. Include some of that cynicism from the books and it could be better than just another light british comedy.

            • Blockquoth ackthpt:

              Sirius Cybernetics == Microsoft? That would have been some foresight

              You're right, Mr. Adams would indeed have to have had lots of foresight to see how Big and how Ugly Micro$soft would become.

              As it turns out, Douglas Adams did have that much foresight; see his anti-MS rants here [aol.com], here [sirius.sgic.fi], here [bbc.co.uk], and... oh, shit, just Google [google.com] for "Douglas Adams + Miscrosoft" and you'll see :-)

              (Disclaimer: I love everything about Douglas Adams, and work for a company [oracle.com] famous for opposing Microsoft.)

    • Re:Word twisting (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Dan Crash ( 22904 )
      It didn't ruin "A Christmas Story".

    • Adams was a jack-of-all-trades in life and writing (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I think it's safe to say that a film simply cannot pick up on the wordplay of Douglas Adams. Adams is simply a master of twisting words that can make the reader laugh out loud.

      I wouldn't say that's safe to say at all. The BBC radioplay version of "The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" precedes the novels - and is (at least in my worthless anonymous opinion) easily on par with the novels as far as humor goes.

    • Re:Word twisting (Score:5, Informative)

      by ikoleverhate ( 607286 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:19AM (#7962551)
      The "voice of the guide" narration in the bbc TV series worked pretty well - when the audience was confused as to what was happening in the main story, a calm voice would start to explain... and leave you even more confused but in fits of laughter.

      "after disproving the existance of god, man goes on to prove 1=2, black=white, and gets run over on the next zebra crossing"

      • Re:Word twisting (Score:4, Funny)

        by eln ( 21727 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @11:17AM (#7963173)
        You know, when I first read the book, when I was quite young, I came to the part about the zebra crossing and became very confused. I couldn't imagine any place in England where there was such an abundance of zebras hanging around that they would have to put in zebra crossings.

        Then of course, the idea of someone getting run over by a zebra, or perhaps a herd of stampeding zebras, made me laugh, so I thought maybe the author was just going for some kind of absurdist humor.
        • The "country" of "England" is absurdist humor.

        • Re:Word twisting (Score:5, Interesting)

          by HTH NE1 ( 675604 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @11:44AM (#7963492)
          You know, when I first read the book, when I was quite young, I came to the part about the zebra crossing and became very confused.

          As would most Americans, when we call them "crosswalks". "Zebra" is an essential part of the humor there. Also, the "I'm in the car park" joke just doesn't have the same punch with "parking lot".

          But then we got the bit about the word Belgium inserted in our edition of the books to offset the sanitizing of the Rory for The Most Gratuitous Use of the Word "Fuck" in a Serious Screenplay. (Also "arsehole" was replaced with "kneebiter".)

          Still, everyone got revisions about probability of rescues and the name of the writer of the worst poetry in the Universe due to problems of people calling phone numbers and the writer actually being a former classmate of Adams who wasn't amused (though in exchange for changing the name, we did get the actual poetry about dead swans).
    • The TV series seemed to manage it... the narration was there, and added to the experience - I believe that the narration was mostly made up of quotes from the guide, but I havn't seen it recently enough to be certain on that.

    • Re:Word twisting (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Silverlock ( 36154 )
      Just a few days ago I found a DVD of the 1981 film version in a video store. Of course, I immediately grabbed it. The special effects and graphics are horrible but it's still Hitchhiker's.. I enjoyed it immensely.

      I bring this up because the original has a ton of narration (accompanied by bad graphics) but, hell, it could be a starfield screensaver with some guy reading the entire text in the background and I would still love it. I think it's too good of a book to be ruined by a change of medium. It's been

      • Re:Word twisting (Score:5, Informative)

        by HTH NE1 ( 675604 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @11:52AM (#7963588)
        Just a few days ago I found a DVD of the 1981 film version in a video store.

        That would be the TV series.

        There is also at least one comic book series.

        And the radio play is the original, though there came a point where multiple versions were being made simultaneously, then more radio episodes to finish out the book adaptions, and only now a movie.

        "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" has almost as many adaptions as has "The War of the Worlds". I wonder if they'll come out with an arcade game version next (Cinematronics did TWotW as an arcade game). Or pinball?

        • Re:Word twisting (Score:4, Informative)

          by jandrese ( 485 ) * <kensama@vt.edu> on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @12:20PM (#7963874) Homepage Journal
          I remember playing HHGTTG on my old Commodore 64. The box came with a bunch of extras (including Peril sensitive sunglasses--they were just black cardboard, a miniature invasion fleet in a baggie, some lint, and a few other things). It was one of those annoying "adventure" games where you have to try 6000 different bizarre things before you stumble across the one that lets you advance the story, because the programmers never bothered to account for the obvious solutions.

          For instance, instead of just cupping your robe in front of the Babel Fish vending machine (because they are too slippery to catch and the vending machine shoots them out at high speed for no particular reason), you have to hang your robe on a hook, put a towel over a drain, move a bag over a door, and pile mail on the bag to get the fish and advance the storyline. Garrgh!

      • "bad graphics"??? (Score:4, Interesting)

        by rpjs ( 126615 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @12:01PM (#7963670)
        Bloody hell, I remember when that series was first shown on the Beeb, we were gobsmacked at the quality of the computer graphics!

        Of course it turned out that the computer graphics weren't computer generated at all 'cos the kit to do them didn't exist then (or if it did was way out of the Beeb's pricerange).

        Ah, those were the days.

    • Re:Word twisting (Score:3, Interesting)

      by SamSim ( 630795 )

      What I really don't want to see in this movie is an identical re-hash, opening in exactly the same way as the book, the TV series and the radio series, with exactly the same dialogue and jokes. There'd just be no point. The film should open on Ford Prefect waking up in the middle of the night and decoding the signal from the incoming Vogons, or Zaphod speeding across the oceans of Damogran towards Easter Island.

  • Sequel (Score:3, Interesting)

    by stanmann ( 602645 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:11AM (#7962468) Journal
    What about the other 4 books in the trilogy???

    • Re:Sequel (Score:2, Interesting)

      by danidude ( 672839 )
      the other 4 books

      Did you forget about "Young Zaphod Plays it Safe" [kulichki.com]?

  • Stephen Moore (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:12AM (#7962479) Homepage
    Stephen Moore's TV version was already a revival. Stephen Moore is the original voice from the radio series, which predates the books, TV series...anything. To my mind remains the best incarnation, though I'll accept an argument in favour of the books.

    He'll probably be quite pleased. Marvin, on the all.

    Cheers,
    Ian

  • Hopes for Zaphod (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dpille ( 547949 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:14AM (#7962498)
    I hope they'll spend some serious CGI money on Zaphod- I was always somewhat disappointed that on the TV series, the 2nd head mostly looked asleep or simply turned from side-to-side. I've always thought there are sections of dialogue in the books that make much less sense or are less funny if you can't imagine each head speaking its own mind.

    • Re:Hopes for Zaphod (Score:5, Interesting)

      by fruey ( 563914 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:20AM (#7962560) Homepage Journal
      They don't have to spend serious CGI. He just has to play the part twice, and then stitch them together, rather like in "Death Becomes Her [imdb.com]" where the body and head parts were filmed separately, and the results were far more realistic than a completely CGI head like TPM or AotC. The plot of the film wasn't great, but it won the 1993 Oscar, BAFTA and Saturn awards for special effects.

      The key part is how to get a decent neck on him so that the two heads work. You could get twins or a pair of similar looking actors to play each part separately, then CGI them into one. Kinda like by tying them together before shooting and stuff. Way too many cool ways to do it, but don't make him 100% CGI!

    • Re:Hopes for Zaphod (Score:2, Insightful)

      by eggoeater ( 704775 )
      I never saw the TV series but from reading the book I've always had in my mind's eye what his two heads would be doing. The thing I like most about Zaphod is that he has two heads, two brains, but one "mind".
      In other words, were not subjected to the shtick of the two heads talking to one another as if there were two people sharing the same body. I like the idea of two faces showing the same emotion in slighly different ways. I also like the idea of only one head at a time talking unless he's screaming

      • Re:Hopes for Zaphod (Score:4, Interesting)

        by belroth ( 103586 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @03:10PM (#7965352)
        In the stage show they had two actors playing Zaphod, at the same time in the same costume.
        One actor was behind the other - the clothes went round both actors so 'zaphod' had two double thickness legs, one double thickness arm and two normal arms (and two heads of course). The shoes were two paris of normal shoes on plates fixed heel to toe. Obviously the actors need to be of the same height and twins would be ideal.
        The two actors on stage split the lines and did some nice business with both arms on the same side doing a task together,like feeding the 'opposite' head while the near head spoke. It was very effective.

    • Re:Hopes for Zaphod (Score:2, Insightful)

      by fermion ( 181285 )
      The second head was a thing that worked well for the book and radio, but was just a distraction on TV. It would just be better to take that bit out in rewrites. It won't be a big problem, since any fans knows that the main character is the Guide, not the people.
    • It's the part Bruce Campbell was born to play!!!

    • Re:Hopes for Zaphod (Score:5, Insightful)

      by cjpez ( 148000 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:51AM (#7962861) Homepage Journal
      Bah. I hope they use as little CG as possible. HHGTTG isn't supposed to be some glitzy high-production thing; it's B-movie camp, and B-movie camp at its finest. Zaphod's plastic-head-attached-to-his-shoulder thing from the BBC TV series was outstanding. CG could ruin a good movie like this.

  • Poor Synopsis (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Afty0r ( 263037 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:14AM (#7962503) Homepage
    If you haven't seen The Office, it takes the subject matter Dilbert has bored us with, and makes it utterly hysterical.
    That's an utterly terrible synopsis. Dilbert and The Office share only their setting (an office) and very little else. In contrast to Dilberts "engineers banging heads against the system" the office chooses to explore primarily the relationships and personalities of people in a small office and the lack of authority or system which allows an incompetent boss to reign supreme.

    • Re:Poor Synopsis (Score:2, Insightful)

      by bigjocker ( 113512 ) *
      the office chooses to explore primarily the relationships and personalities of people in a small office and the lack of authority or system which allows an incompetent boss to reign supreme

      And that differs from dilbert because ...

    • Re:Poor Synopsis (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Jellybob ( 597204 )
      That, and claiming it's hysterical.

      Everytime I've watched The Office, I havn't felt amused... I've felt embarrased.

      Especially the lead character I feel like I shouldn't be watching someone make that much of a dick of himself... and more disturbingly it appears to be the only part he can play.

      • Re:Poor Synopsis (Score:4, Insightful)

        by pacman on prozac ( 448607 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @12:12PM (#7963782)
        He was a standup comedian for years and is still going with it so he does do a few other things.

        It's meant to make you cringe, thats the point of it really. They deliberatly avoid obvious gags, its not that kind of show. I guess you could see it as one of those shows thats main point is to make you feel better about your own life because its not as bad as theirs, although I have worked in offices with worse bosses & atmospheres so I could be wrong on that.

        I'd say its a very individual thing as to whether you find it incredibly funny or just annoying as hell, and perhaps a very thin line. For years I just thought the former, now I'm hooked. My girlfriend hates it and cannot sit for more than 30 seconds with it on the tv.

        If you do appreciate their humour then it is hysterical, they are more down-to-earth than most other comedies on the TV so it seems a fair statement. It wouldn't have run for 2 series plus xmas special if nobody liked it either.

      • Re:Poor Synopsis (Score:4, Informative)

        by TwistedSquare ( 650445 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @12:29PM (#7963944) Homepage
        Depends on what sort of humour you appreciate really. Tim's expressions while the crazy world happens around him are hilarious, Keith can even make exhaling funny, and Brent so perfectly picks out all the terrible boss characteristics that some find it amazing, and many find it too close to home...

        Also, not on a hysterical note, your sympathy for Brent grows more and more towards the end of the series (last 2 included), including the amazing scene where he is fired and then stands up to reveal his costume :)

    • ...is a Christopher Guest phony documentary -- "Waiting for Guffman", "Mighty Wind", etc. They work on the Excruciating Awkwardness principle of comedy: Put your characters into situations so embarrassing, pathetic, and all-around squirmy your audience wants to scream. Then any joke gets a big relief laugh. Fortunately the jokes in the Office are pretty good, but what's really strong is it's minute observation of characters and cubicle life.

      The Office is hilarious but you'll need some time to get throu
  • ...but don't expect laugh-a-minute jokes. It's incorrectly called a comedy, when it is really a satire. If you understand the type of humor in "Six Feet Under", you'll understand the type of humor in "The Office". The first season is available on Netflix.

  • Movie go'ers who haven't read the book.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by eggoeater ( 704775 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:15AM (#7962513) Journal
    ...will be pissed when they find out that the Ultimate question about life, the universe, and everything, is never revealed.
    I remember after the end of FOTR I overheard people saying "What happened to the ring?". Were these people living in a cave before going to the theater?? ....but hey...screw 'em.
    This is going to be great.

    • Re:Movie go'ers who haven't read the book.... (Score:4, Informative)

      by corbettw ( 214229 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:30AM (#7962665) Journal
      ...will be pissed when they find out that the Ultimate question about life, the universe, and everything, is never revealed.

      What are you talking about? The Ultimate Question to Life, the Universe, and Everything is "What is 6 times 9?"

      The answer, of course, is 42.

      (For the humor impaired, the joke is that 6*9 is not, actually, 42, implying there's something seriously wrong with the Universe when it can't even answer its own question correctly.)
      • (For the humor impaired, the joke is that 6*9 is not, actually, 42, implying there's something seriously wrong with the Universe when it can't even answer its own question correctly.)

        Actually, the Earth matrix that was calculating the question got irrevocably screwed up by the arrival of all the telephone cleaners, hair dressers, and other useless beings from another planet. Thus, depending on how you interpret it, either the question of Life, the Universe and Everything is 7*6 or the question is simply lost forever.

        • Wish I had found this before posting my first reply:

          From wikipedia:
          "In the original radio series, this scene occurs at the end of the first series (Fit the Sixth). On discovering the question, Arthur Dent remarks "I always said there was something fundamentally wrong with the universe.". "
      • (For the humor impaired, the joke is that 6*9 is not, actually, 42, implying there's something seriously wrong with the Universe when it can't even answer its own question correctly.)

        I'm not quite certain this was the point of the "6x9" joke, given that the program of the computer called Earth was corrupted by the arrival of the Gulgafrincham. OTOH, I do agree about the premise that there is something seriously wrong with the Universe. :)

  • I'd pick... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Xpilot ( 117961 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:17AM (#7962523) Homepage
    Sean Connery for Slartibartfast!

  • The Office (Score:5, Informative)

    by grandmofftarkin ( 49366 ) * <3b16-ihd3@xemaps.com> on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:18AM (#7962533)
    For those of you who have never seen 'The Office' it is a BBC comedy filmed in a semi documentary format (though it is all fictional). On the BBC website linked above there is a clips section [bbc.co.uk] to give you a taste of what it is like. Though to really 'get it' you have to watch a couple of episodes. You can buy the complete first series online from PlayUSA [playusa.com].
    • I saw it for the first and last time yesterday. To me it was slow and boring although it was a plus that it lacked the censoring and PC crap that makes American comedy shows toothless and trivial. I guess I will give it another go. :)

  • Picture (Score:5, Interesting)

    by klocwerk ( 48514 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:19AM (#7962538) Homepage
    here's a pic of him.
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/media/images/38281000/jpg/_3 8281639_office300.jpg [bbc.co.uk]

    looks like he could pull it off. never seen that movie though.


  • Anyone who liked Marvin the paranoid android.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by mgpeter ( 132079 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:19AM (#7962553) Homepage
    Check out Marvin the Web Server [boulder.co.us].

  • It would be interesting... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:22AM (#7962576)
    To see how well this does here in the States.
    It might gain a crossover audience for special effects (they do go to many weird places, after all), but I don't think it'll get good critical reviews. The Hitchiker's Guide doesn't have a three-act movie structure, it bounces around from episode to episode. It's really more suited to be a TV series.
    It's also peculiarly British. Think about it: Arthur Dent's home is destroyed (twice) by bureaucrats. (Here it would have to be corporations.) They spend time looking for a cup of tea. The end of the universe comes, *and it's no big deal*: people go to a restaurant to watch it happen. (As they say, in England, death is imminent, in Canada, death is inevitable, and in California, death is optional.) The frat-boy Zaphod is a figure of fun and the hero is the mild-mannered Arthur Dent.
    I'm also disappointed that they're probably going to make Trillian into a bimbo again; she was supposed to be an astrophysicist. Nobody seems to like nerd women, except for Slashdot, Harvey Pekar, and Howard Dean ;)
    And I wonder how well the nerd community is going to rally around it: THHGTTG has been out for a while, and some younger nerds have never heard of it. Hey, I never knew about the Goon Show until I read they were part of the inspiration for Python (I'm 24).
    Oh well, I hope it's good...

    • Re:It would be interesting... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by siskbc ( 598067 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:38AM (#7962742) Homepage
      It's also peculiarly British. Think about it: Arthur Dent's home is destroyed (twice) by bureaucrats. (Here it would have to be corporations.) They spend time looking for a cup of tea. The end of the universe comes, *and it's no big deal*: people go to a restaurant to watch it happen.

      Right, but all these lovely stereotypes are why we Americans love to poke fun at the British. Also, remember that the Hitchhiker series as as beloved by geeks on the left side of the pond as the right.

      I'm also disappointed that they're probably going to make Trillian into a bimbo again; she was supposed to be an astrophysicist. Nobody seems to like nerd women, except for Slashdot, Harvey Pekar, and Howard Dean ;)

      It would be a disappointment if she were *just* a bimbo...but she *is* a bimbo.

      And I wonder how well the nerd community is going to rally around it: THHGTTG has been out for a while, and some younger nerds have never heard of it.

      Who? Let me go kick their asses. I think the standards will be high, meaning it will either be reviled or loved by the geek community.

    • I'm also disappointed that they're probably going to make Trillian into a bimbo again; she was supposed to be an astrophysicist.

      You're way off the mark there by thinking only of her chosen appearance and happy disposition. Trillian was always portrayed as bright and level headed --- in fact she was just about the only sane person around in a universe of loonies. :-) The fact that she was pretty just let her take advantage of men's usual attitude towards the "weaker sex" (not that there was ever much of

  • Deep Thought (Score:4, Funny)

    by CelticWhisper ( 601755 ) <celticwhisperNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:22AM (#7962581)
    Maybe the Deep Thought supercomputer will be played by Virginia Tech's Power Mac G5 cluster! I'm sure Apple would state that if any computer can tell us the meaning of life, it's the G5. How's 'bout it, guys?

  • Wouldn't Cmdr Taco make a better (Score:5, Funny)

    by 3.5 stripes ( 578410 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:24AM (#7962598)
    Vogon ??? :)
  • Christopher Lloyd as Slartibartfast.
    Mike Myers as Zaphod Beeblebrox.
    Owen Wilson as Ford Prefect.
    January Jones as Trillian.
    Alan Rickman as...someone. Maybe the waiter at Milliways? He just has to be in there somewhere.

    Yeah, I know, too expensive, but I think it would work pretty well.

  • This has everything to be great (Score:5, Informative)

    by rcastro0 ( 241450 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:45AM (#7962811) Homepage
    I hope they have a good budget and don't spoil it. BTW, I don't know that actor, and haven't seen "The Office", but his puzzled face in the picture someone posted looks perfect. If this works perhaps more people will get to know where the names "DeepThought", "Trillian" and "BabelFish" first appeared.

    Anyway, Douglas Adams fans should know that his computer works are now abandonware, and available for free download:

    Last Chance to See -- The CD ROM, multimedia version of his book about endangered species [the-underdogs.org]

    The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- the text adventure game adaptation (by Infocom) [the-underdogs.org]

    Bureaucracy -- the original text adventure game (by Infocom) [the-underdogs.org]

    Cheers.

  • WHY is this being entrusted to a newbie director!? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by vapid transit ( 738521 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @10:46AM (#7962818)
    WHY!? For the love of god. I've never heard of Garth Jennings. Its not like this guy's even worked his way up to director. IMDB does not have him listed as crew or writer for any major motion pictures. I hate to be negative but I'm truly anticipating disappointment from this film.
  • Those of us who were lucky enough to attend the 2000 ApacheCon in London saw a keyonote [apachecon.com] by Douglas Adams. Little did we know that he has less than a year to live. I remember he was excited about his recent move to California and talked about his daughter too. After the keynote we all got a copy of the authographed Hitchhiker Guide book.

    Anyway, I hope the movie is good.

  • Zaphod played by... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Popageorgio ( 723756 ) <popsnap@gmail.com> on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @11:09AM (#7963078) Homepage
    Clearly, Johnny Depp would make a kick-ass Zaphod. I'm thinking the same attitude he gave to Captain Jack Sparrow in "Pirates of the Caribbean" and Hunter S. Thompson in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas."

    All the film's creators should keep Oscar Wilde's words in mind: In an absurd play, no character can acknowledge the absurdity, or it all breaks down. Thus, the new screenplay should omit lines like the "these guys are ridiculous!" parts in the Shooty and Bang-Bang scene (where the heroes are trapped behind a computer bank on Magrathea).

    As for the bit parts, there are dozens of chances for cameos. For example, Bill Murray and Steve Martin should play Magikthies and Vroomfondel.

  • Trillian??? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by advocate_one ( 662832 ) on Tuesday January 13, 2004 @12:13PM (#7963793)
    This young lady [imdb.com] would be ideal for trillian...

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