media consumption

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

As a like many nerdly teenage boys, I read the five-book "triolgy," the first of which is the basis for this movie. It seems the the director and screenwriter made a half-hearted attempt to provide a plot for story that had very little plot to begin with. It is basically one long comedic riff on man's inconsequential role in the vastness of an infinite universe.

I can't really quibble with the addition of the standard Holllwood tropes of a love story and hero-villian conflict where none really existed in the book. For the most part, the filmmakers stayed pretty faithful to the original. I'm still confused by some of their choices (the purpose of adding John Malkovich's character, for instance), but I'm not going to rant about the differences between the book and the movie as I have been known to do.

Bottom line: if you have read the book and/or still possess some vestiges of a teenage nerd's sense of humor, you'll likely enjoy this movie; otherwise, you'll probably be wondering what the point of the whole thing is.

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