It wouldn't be very accommodating to dive right into a discussion of a movie based on the works of Douglas Adams without mentioning a little something about The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for the uninitiated. Thus, what follows are a few mundane facts: The Hitchhiker's Guide started life as a 1978 radio play, the success of which led to a series of books, which has then reasonably become the most accessible way to introduce oneself to the world of Adams. If I tried to describe his particular brand of British humor, I would never be able to do it justice. However, if  you appreciate dry comedy built on asides, random tangents, and an anarchic playfulness with words, Adams is for you. The stories here are not the main attraction; rather, laughter and amusement come from the numerous episodes of lightly sardonic, conceptual satire that form the meat of the works.

All right, so much of that was more opinion than fact, but there you have it, anyway.

The curious thought that occured to me while reading the books is how difficult they would be to adapt to a visual medium. It's curious because, shortly after the first two books were written, this had already occurred. In 1981, BBC produced a TV mini-series, with Adams's direct involvement. I have not seen these shows, although they have been described to me as comically low-budget and reasonably successful at conveying the spirit of the books.

I wonder even more about that after seeing the new movie adaptation, which I felt was not entirely successful at conveying that same spirit. I thought it simply couldn't be done, and I still haven't changed my mind. 

Adams was also directly involved with attempting to get this movie made, but sadly he passed away in 2001. He had almost finished writing the script, which was then tightened up by Karey Kirkpatrick. Just the same, something must've gotten lost in the translation to film, where the focus has shifted from the aforementioned conceptual satire to what feels like a whimpering attempt to make the movie accessible for general audiences. It's less about the idea that something so mundane as intergalactic bureaucracy could cause the destruction of the earth, and more about how that destruction could cause emotional consternation to the planet's lone survivors. In the Hitchhiker's galaxy, this is not a good thing.

The story revolves around a quartet of major characters, with the hapless and ordinary Earthman Arthur Dent (Martin Freeman) filling the role of protagonist. He's originally a cipher character, a surrogate for the audience as he embarks on crazy adventures in a wacky, unfamiliar galaxy; here in the movie, he's transitioned to a much more active role, even to the point where he gets to have a central love story. This allows him to be more fleshed out as a character, but it also takes focus away from the events around him, where much of the comedic commentary is contained. As a result, the film seems more concerned with what's communicated between him and his romantic interest, Trillian (Zooey Deschanel), thereby relegating to the side the remaining two characters, Ford Prefect (Mos Def) and Zaphod Beeblebrox (Sam Rockwell), who seem to form some sort of oblivious comedy duo and little more.

Much slapstick ensues, with some amusing but meaningless absurdity popping in and out, mostly without the aid of momentum or setup (consider the scene where the alien Vogon race reads poetry, and not only is the supposed impending torture not prepared for in a way that will allow the audience to appreciate it, but the recital itself is drowned out by voice-over narration). What's missing here are the ideas -- or, more to the point, the seamless incorporation of those ideas into a movie. Some of these ideas are narrated to the audience by "The Hitchhiker's Guide" itself, an electronic encyclopedia that contains very subjective information about everything in the universe -- these sections, accompanied by animation, are perhaps the most successfully funny because they are practically lifted word-for-word from the books. But they appear in a separated manner; the rest of the movie, over-concerned with outright zaniness as it is, doesn't match the wit of the Guide's entries, and one gets the feeling that the movie might have been funnier had it been nothing but a sequence of those entries.

So I still wonder if there could have been a way to communicate on screen what the books communicate so well with words. I think operating in a mode that's more loyal to Adams's sense of humor and less worried about what the audience is going to like would have helped. It should have been loopy, deadpan, smart comedy; it should have been Monty Python and the Holy Grail meets Futurama -- droll, silly British wit that wouldn't have given a fig about the emotional fulfillment of the main character, that would have employed him as part of a bigger universal scheme that he's never fully aware of, nor wants to be. As it is, with its heart in the right place but its mind functioning in the the wrong galactic sector, this movie feels only halfway there.

(Released by Touchstone Pictures and rated "PG" for thematic elements, action and mild language.)