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Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Plot: Based on the wildly popular comedic sci-fi novel by Douglas Adams. It follows human Arthur Dent as he is forced to become a galactic hitchhiker after the Earth is destroyed to make way for a hyperspace byway.
News:
4 January, 2002
The untimely passing of Douglas Adams seems to have actually helped this movie move forward. His former agent Ed Victor spoke on BBC's show Drive about the project. "It's in that place known as development hell in Hollywood. Ironically since Douglas's death things have started to look better for the film because a lot of people like me have determined that this film must be made in some kind of honour to him...we all want to see it made and hopefully it will be". What about the tone of the movie: "I think you'd have to shoot it as a British thing as for example JK Rowling insisted that her book was done as a British film as opposed to a Hollywood film. The things about Douglas's books, the humour of Douglas's books, is that you have to take them seriously, you can't play them for laughs. They just induce laughter and I think I could see just how this could be done. I know that Douglas thought Hugh Grant would make a marvelous Arthur and one of the Hollywood actors that's been tracking this for a long time, who wanted top play Zaphod Beeblebrox was Jim Carrey. So if you put those two together perhaps you could see a film there".
What do you think? Talk about it on the Forums
14 November, 2000
Douglas Adams wants Hugh Laurie to play the part of Arthur Dent. That's the word from director Jay Roach. "Hugh's his favorite choice." says Roach.
"Casting for the movie will be international. We would cast Ford Prefect as an American. Zaphod Beeblebrox could be Jim Carrey or Bruce Willis, someone big," says Roach.
The big problem is that the project is stuck in development hell. None of the Hollywood studios have been willing so far to anty up the cash for the project. "The studios see it as an obscure Monty Python in space," says Roach. Worse they see a potentially huge price tag. "It could cost up to $100 million," predicts Roach.
7 June, 2000
Not long ago Stax review the script for this project and gave it a thorough thrashing. Now one of his compatriot's over at FilmForce has gotten a hold of the script. If anything, he hated it even more. This is truly depressing. From the review I quote, "I can safely say that this is the worst adaptation from book to screenplay that I've read/heard of/seen in my entire life. Everything that makes Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy enjoyable is completely stripped out in this screenplay." Ouch.
May 31, 2000
Oh bitter disappointment. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy of five books are among my all time favorites so naturally I hoped that someday someone would be able to make a good movie out of them. At the same time I've held no illusions that this would be an easy task. Much of the best humor comes simply from Douglas Adams' writing style. One of my favorite lines came from the fourth book. "All eyes were on Ford, some of them were on stalks." There is absolutely no way that a line like that can be translated to film. It just won't work.
Pardon the rant but I needed to say something after reading Stax's review of a draft of the screenplay for a potential movie based on the first book. If you consider my theory on making a movie based on this material you won't be surprised to hear that Stax didn't think too highly of the script.
By the SECOND PARAGRAPH (!) of the FIRST PAGE, I was having trouble "getting" this story or even staying interested in it. I immediately had to go back and re-read the first page. Trying to follow or care about this story was nearly impossible the more I read. I was interested in the story until the end of Act One but once Zaphod and Trillian pick up Arthur and Ford the script lost me for good. At that point, whatever interest I had in it withered away. Characters did and said things that seemed to have little or no reason; events transpired that were pointless and forced; the humor became more transparent and, well, unfunny; the story simply lost momentum. If I didn't have to finish this script for my review, I would have tossed Guide aside. "But it's not supposed to make sense." Okay but is that still supposed to make me care what's happening?
To read the entire review head over to Stax's home at FilmForce.
31 March, 2000
Rumors have floated about forever that Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy would be made into a movie. If you're not familiar with his trilogy of five books centering around the Guide then run right out and read them now. I'll wait.
Done? Good. Now don't you feel stupid for not having read them earlier? Anyway, it's starting to look like a movie may actually get made. Coming Attractions is reporting that the script is done but Adams keeps making changes. One scene will be used from the radio adaptation that has Zaphod visiting the offices of the Guide. The tone and style of the offices should resemble the alien airport scenes from Men In Black but better.
