DVD Review: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

09/12/05

For those unfamiliar with the universe of The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy, myself included, the best way to describe the film is a British comedy wrapped in a sci-fi wrapper viewed through a pair of beer goggles that went from full to empty during the opening credits. That might just begin to describe the randomness, humor and creativity of this film. So, if you?re up for a truly unique experience, today?s release of The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy on DVD is an event you won?t want to miss. And if you?re of the more sophisticated bend, it?s an event you won?t begin to understand. SO don?t even try. There?s no effective way to summarize the plot of The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy, but if a guy named Cliff were to take notes, here?s how they might read: Man meets woman. Man loses woman. Man discovers his house is about to be bulldozed to make room for a highway bypass. Man freaks out. Man discovers that, in fact, the entire planet Earth is about to be bulldozed to make room for a cosmic highway bypass. Man grows confused. Earth is imploded. Man hitches an intergalactic ride with an alien and, after enduring poetic torture by a bureaucratic alien race, is reunited with woman. Woman is involved with the president of the galaxy. Man grows disheartened. Woman is kidnapped. Man and alien friends cut through galactic red tape to rescue her. Man and woman make up. Man discovers a backup Earth while on a tour with God?s contractor. Man and woman live happily ever after. Yeah, it?s just that bizarre. Maybe those beer goggles will help you understand the plot. Understanding or no, the originality of The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy simply can not be denied. From the script to the scenarios, this is one movie, and one DVD, unlike any you?ve ever seen. The Monty Python troupe may be hilarious, but their hilarity was generally due to outlandish situations. I don?t mean to imply that the destruction of Earth for an intergalactic overpass is particularly realistic, but Arthur Dent and his hitchhiking crew are funny both because of their situation and their ability to capture their characters? all-too-human quirks. Arthur, for example, is an insecure guy who?s just looking for acceptance, while the president is a megalomaniac looking for little more than females and fortune. It?s the Yin and Yang inside every man, which makes their struggle for Trillian?s affections, and their approaches to saving her, so downright entertaining. Add to that the not-so-subtle commentary on bureaucrats and an eternally depressed robot (voiced by Alan Rickman), and the laughs just never stop. For the first and last third of the movie, any way. You see, where The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy is special because of its random humor, the middle third of the film actually makes an attempt to advance the plot. The storytelling and situations during those 40 minutes are necessary to get from Points A to C, but while the art direction in this span receives just as much attention as the intro and conclusion, its other aspects just don?t seem to have received as much love. Consequently, the movie?s midsection tends to drag. Aside from the movie, the DVD release of The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy features a knapsack full of bonus features. For starters, the film has not one but two commentary tracks, one with the director, producer and two actors, the other with the executive producer and a colleague about whom you won?t really care. Then, the bonus features have not one but two sequences of deleted scenes, one of which is legitimate, the other of which is completely faked but actually more entertaining. The DVD-requisite ?making of? feature is also here, with a nine-minute series of interviews with cast and crew. But, like the movie itself, the two most memorable bonus features are actually the two most random: a hangman-like game and a sing-along feature. The game, called Marvin?s Hangman, is actually an interactive game of hangman where viewers have five chances to try and guess a four-letter word. And no, it?s not that type of four-letter word; they?re all docile, like ?home.? Rather than draw pieces of a man hanging from a noose, the game marks incorrect guesses by removing limbs from Marvin, the eternally depressed robot, who comments the entire time about his lot in life...and yours. The sing-along feature, meanwhile, invites viewers to follow the bouncing ball and sing along with the dolphins from the opening sequence as they sing ?So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish.? Bizarre? Yes. Random? Yes, Classic Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy? Absolutely. The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy makes no claims of being an all-audiences movie. This is a film written and directed by creative (and perhaps disturbed) individuals who have a knack for somehow bringing their crazy ideas together. As a result, the DVD release of The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy isn?t going to be for all audiences, either. Of all the DVDs of 2005, none more blatantly yells ?rent me first? than this one. If you like it, you?ll really like it. But if you find The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy just a bit too weird, you?ll be really glad you rented it first. -- Jonas Allen

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