It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem. For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent then dolphins because he has achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - while all the dolphins had ever don was much about in the water having a good time. But conversely the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is one of my three favorite books (for reference: the other two are Ender's Game and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.) I always worry a bit about properties I really like getting converted into movies since it's such a hit and miss prospect and even if they do it right it's unlikely that they'll please true fans. Sin City proved it can be done, but the odds aren't good.

I'm especially hesitant because my favorite part of Hitchhiker's Guide is it's whimsical and random wit. This book has no focus and makes asides all the time to talk about off the wall things (the quote above, where all the ball point pens disappear to, the nature of political power in the galaxy, the ravenous bugblatter beast of traal, how to mix a pan-galactic gargle blaster and the award winning fjords of Norway are all good examples.) The problem with a movie format is you just can't take that many turns away from the plot without leaving the audience behind. I've read some Hitchhiker's Guide fans really enjoyed the movie, which gives me hope. Some people have talked about the wicked fast pace, which could be from a ton of asides thrown in. I certainly hope so.

Even though they're sure to leave out tons of stuff, the story itself will still be imbued with whimsy and ridiculousness. As I've talked about before it's tough to sustain a movie on whimsy alone. If you stop and think about the plot, racing around the galaxy in a stolen spaceship powered by a probability manipulation device - which causes improbable things like a pair nuclear warheads turning into a bowl of petunias and a sperm whale - with no real purpose or ending, it's hard to get much more whimsical then that.

I find people who enjoy satire, wit, and whimsy enjoy the Hitchhiker's Guide book. I expect that same set of people to enjoy the movie - even if it's in a mediocre effort. Source material this rich just can't get diluted that far. And Douglas Adams (the author) was heavily involved in the pre-production until his untimely death a few years ago - so that lends some legitimacy.

Rereading this whole thing it sounds like I'm just enumerating all the ways this could end up being bad. I think that's a self defense mechanism for me: I am really excited about this movie. I love the book and want badly for the movie to be an excellent alternate way for me to enjoy the Hitchhiker's universe. So all this waffling I'm doing here is just me trying to keep my expectations reasonable. I still expect to be there on Friday night like a good fanboy.

And if nothing else, Alan Rickman doing the voicework for Marvin the super-intelligent permanently depressed robot is a stroke of casting genius.

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