OT-The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

[hoffman]

Looks like it's been turned into a movie.
Far out huh?

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Hoffman in Warner Robins Ga

[Milacron of PM]

Of course it already was a "movie" sort of...a series shown in the US on PBS back in the 1980's which is available as a complete video.

The new one-

http://hitchhikers.movies.go.com

[ibewgypsie]

I happen to love Sci-Fi.. The extreme of "pig" noise sound effects and Nazi booted "future" evil empires kills me sometimes. In that event we have ATF-SWAT teams in Nazi helmets. Evil? only if they try to convict you of something. Don't get in thier way.

You have to study a monster a lot deeper than it's clothes to recognize them. Actions are the number one. I guess that is kinda hard to represent so they use a "morons' interpertation of evil doers. (Spongebob squarepants.... Evil's afoot... Evil...)

David

[Paul Gauthier]

Sci-Fi is at the top of my list for reading, viewing, etc. and I read the book many years ago along with the sequals (sp?) I will see the movie soon.

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Paul G.

[Dave Opincarne]

I'll be very suprised if they don't ruin it.

Don't Panic

Dave

[WLW-19958]

It's not easy....being a cop!


-Blue Chips-
Webb

[jackb]

Dave,
The commercial I saw showed Zaphod Beeblebrox with only one head and (correct if I am wrong) I don't remember a "cute" little robot called "Marvin the paranoid android". http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//frown.gif But; to be fair, it has been a long time since I read the books or saw the serial that was on PBS.

Jack

[Tuckerfan]

Zaphod in the film does, in fact, have two heads. The second head, however, is hidden, and only pops up for a second in one of the trailers (It's basically up Zaphod's nose). Douglas Adams had part of the script finished before he died, and the guy who finished the script seems to have about the same kind of humor as Adams, so it might not be a total crapfest (unlike Starship Troopers). I'm eagerly looking forward to this. Even if it stinks, it'll probably be better than the Star Wars movie due out next month.

[hoffman]

I'm also a big Kurt Vonnegut fan and I hope THGTTG translates into a better film than some of Vonneguts works.
"Mother Night" is an exception. Good movie, great book...

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Hoffman in Warner Robins Ga

[jackb]

I have always thought that Yoda lost his personallity when he became all digital. Maybe George Lucas should have had Frank Oz looking over the shoulder of the digital animators. It is sad to say but I find that typical of the current crop of animators.

I used to teach CAD at the local community college. There was a computer animation class taught in the class room next door. I always thought that the majority of the students going into that class didn't have a clue what creating a real character was all about. In their minds it meant giving motion to a picture and that was all the class really taught. There really is so much more to it.

Jack

[HTRN]

All I know is that I got my towel ready...


HTRN

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This Old Shed (http://thisoldshed.tripod.com)

[Nutter]

ROTFLMAO! Damn! It's been years since I thought about that book. I had forgotten about the towel thing. What is it they eat after their jumps across deep space? Peanuts?

I can't wait for the movie. I may even have to re-read the book for the 5th or 6th time over the last 25 years before I go see it. I've got the BBC (or PBS or wheover) video. I'll probably watch that tonight.

[wierdscience]

Movie looks to be interesting,I also like the looks of the Crusade movie,I am skeptical thou,I have a feeling Hollyweird will protray it as us "mean ole western European Christian beating up on the poor Muslims"type movie.

Anybody see Sahara yet? I saw the trailer where the guy is using parts of a fabric winged plane as a sail board,even thou most of the fabric is torn or not there at all http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//rolleyes.gif

[Tuckerfan]

weird, that's not the half of it. You know where the treasure's hidden? On a Civil War battleship in the middle of the Sahara desert! How, in the bloody blue blazes does a Civil War battleship end up in the middle of the desert half a world a way? http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//rolleyes.gif

[BillH]

What you see are the results of coked up producers brainstorming, just pure crap.

[BillB]

There was also an excellent radio serial version some years ago, produced by BBC, IIRC.

Marvin ("...and me, with a pain in all the diodes down my left side") was indeed an important character in the original, although the one in the movie sure doesn't match my mental picture.

I sure hope the Golgafrinchem "B Ark" is in the movie. I've maintained for years that it was a metaphor for the Mayflower.

BillB
from Virginia, where the Mayflower would have landed had they had any competence at navigation.

[Charlie Rose]

Went and watched Sahara, its a pretty good flic ,no cussing, no in your face sex, just a good adventure show. If you like Clive Cussler books you'll like it. You can take the wife and kids no sweat.

[bob308]

i went to see sahara. it was good. and they tell you how the ironclad gets there. they were ironclads not battleships.

the reasons the mayflower landed where it did was they ran out of beer and if they would have gone to virgina they would have been under contract to england

[cfoster]

I'm a huge Clive Cussler fan. I've read all of his Dirk Pitt books, Sahara being my favorite. The only thing I was worried about was how well they would translate to film. Cussler can be so "imaginative" that I thought a film translation would just come out as hokey. I haven't seen it, but I have heard a lot of good things, so I guess I should. However, Steven Zahn as Al Giordino? Uh-uh...

Sin City was awesome. Highly recommended for anyone who likes gritty movies.

[Spin Doctor]

Cussler books remind me of the old line about Popular Mechanics, "never believe what you see on the cover". Sure they're fun but suspension of disbelief is a major requirement to wade through one. Matt M as Pitt, I don't think so. But Zahn as Al G. That may be the most inspired bit of casting in the movie. He's a hoot on "Saving Silverman" as is R. Lee Emery. Also Macy as the Admiral. It could be the role he was born for.

[Dave Opincarne]

From Memory:

Far out in the unfashionable western spiral arm of the Milky Way Galaxy lies a small unreguard little yellow sun. Orbiting this sun at a distance of aproximitly 98 million miles is an uterly insignificant blue-green planet whose ape decended life forms are so incredibly primative that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea. This planet has, or rather, had a problem which was this: Most of the people were unhappy most of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this, most involving the movment of small green pieces of paper; which is odd, because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy...

I haven't worn a digital watch since reading those lines twenty years ago.

Marvin was indeed a key charichter in all the books (except the last "Mostly Harmless" which was AWFULL and I've tried to sear from my memory) but I would never describe him as "cute" or little. Terminaly morose would be a better description.

Penuts (salt) and lots of bitter were the prferd preparation, but I think it was before teleporting.

Golgafrinchians were not introduced until the next book "The Reastraunt At The End Of The Universe"

Whithe the above noted exception all the books are great, my favorite has to be "So Long And Thanks For All The Fish". The Dirk Gently series is also worth checking out.

A. 42

Dave

[Dave Opincarne]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/42_%28number%29

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=answer+to+life+the+universe+and+everything&btnG=Search

[BillH]

OK, I just watched the BBC version of the Hitchkikers guide, and I can honestly say that I just wasted valuable hours of my life for this crap. THe English humor in the movie has turned me into Marvin.

[wierdscience]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by BillH:
OK, I just watched the BBC version of the Hitchkikers guide, and I can honestly say that I just wasted valuable hours of my life for this crap. THe English humor in the movie has turned me into Marvin. </font>

That bad huh? http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//biggrin.gif

[wierdscience]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by cfoster:
I'm a huge Clive Cussler fan. I've read all of his Dirk Pitt books, Sahara being my favorite. The only thing I was worried about was how well they would translate to film. Cussler can be so "imaginative" that I thought a film translation would just come out as hokey. I haven't seen it, but I have heard a lot of good things, so I guess I should. However, Steven Zahn as Al Giordino? Uh-uh...

Sin City was awesome. Highly recommended for anyone who likes gritty movies.
</font>

Ha,I read Cussler when I was in school,english teacher wanted us to do a report on a fiction piece,but she said those books were a little racey in places http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//biggrin.gif Ya,she read all of them http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//wink.gif

I made it up to her on the non-fiction report,"History of the modern Submarine" 104 pages long http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//biggrin.gif She gave up spell checking on page 48,seems dive station design was a bit boring to her http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//biggrin.gif I got a 98+ extra credit for my "extreme level of research" http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net//biggrin.gif

[Milacron of PM]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">OK, I just watched the BBC version of the Hitchkikers guide, and I can honestly say that I just wasted valuable hours of my life for this crap. THe English humor in the movie has turned me into Marvin.</font>

One thing interesting about the series to me was that the whole thing was hilareous until the last episode, which sucked. It's as if they just ran out of time, money or weren't quite sure how to end it or something.

I heard an interview with someone a few years ago who wrote a biography of the the author, Douglas Adams, and he said that Adams was quite the procrastinator and would often get the scrips in at the last second or even beyond the "last second", so I wonder if that had something to do with it.

[BillB]

I agree that the old TV series left something to be desired. Interestingly enough, the BBC says that the first two books were originally written as radio scripts, presumably for the excellent BBC series I mentioned above. Used to have the whole thing on tape, until my then-adolescent son needed more tapes for Grateful Dead concerts....

The good news is that there is a *new* radio series about to come out, based on the last two books:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3666506.stm

More here, which indicates that a 3rd installment of the radio series was broadcast last year:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hitchhikers/

Clearly no need to panic.

BillB

[Tuckerfan]

Bill, you can get the radio series on CD now, and there's a deluxe edition of it available that's supposed to be chock full of goodies. I haven't had the money to be able to pick it up, so no idea if it's worth the premium over the regular version.

[Jpfalt]

D Thomas,

That's the influence of the Michael Odonahue school of writing. You get to word 2000 and then it's "and then they all got hit by a bus. The End"

I've really enjoyed all the various incarnations of The Guide. One thing from the radio series I missed in the rest of the versions was "Lintilla" and the "shoe event horizon".

I'm looking forward to this new version, but I think I preferred the BBC TV series Marvin. The movie version looks too much like Twiki out of Buck Rogers to suit me.

I guess if I was to have my fondest wish, they would do a series like the Lord of the Rings flicks covering the whole thing in excruciating detail so that you can watch it over again and find new things in it. Second wish, I guess, would be for them to do The Hobbit the same way they did the Lord Of The Rings movies. Last wish would be for the Lord Fouls Bane series of books in a well done series of movies.