Homocon

Things I really liked about the film adaptation: all the main characters are well cast, but President Zaphod, played by Sam Rockwell (who's fast becoming one of my favorite people to watch on-screen for his roles in Charlie's Angles and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind) is terrific, constantly tossing his bleach-blonde hair, flashing a ridiculously white smile and giggling like a rockstar on ecstasy . . . waaaaay better (IMHO) than the original and woefully low-budget BBC series Zaphod, while the casting of American born Zooey Deschanel as the Trillian character is also an improvement, with the adventurous, no-nonsense brunette replacing the bubble-headed, squeaky-voice blonde from the series.

Mos Def as Ford Prefect is so good that I can't even remember the Ford Prefect who came before him, and the hippity-hoppity, toe-tapping greeting between he and Zaphod when they first show up on the stolen spaceship Heart of Gold, with its marvelously rendered Improbability Drive (that creates some of the most memorable visual effects of the film -- like the sight of a giant ball of yarn, with knitting needles stuck through it, hurtling through interplanetary space), is a genuinely sweet toss-away in a film stuffed with so many ("Take his brain!" and John Malkovich, for example).

But Marvin the Paranoid Android is a bit of a disappointment (where's his mouth?), Hellen Mirren as the voice of Deep Thought is just plain wrong, and the absence of the restaurant at the end of the universe is unfortunate (I was looking forward to the cow that asks to be eaten), but maybe in a sequel . . . ?

I was gratified to see, however, that they did include the scene with the sperm whale plummeting towards ground.

Slartibartfast and the planetary-construction industry is a gorgeous element, with its special-effects flight through a galaxy-sized factory floor littered with half-finished mountain ranges and alien landscapes, and the POV gun (Point of View), created by Deep Thought, contributes to what I thought was the funniest moment in the entire film (where the disappointing film version of Marvin makes up for everything).

So, yeah . . . it has its ups and downs, but it was intriguing enough to watch more than once, and clever enough to hope a sequel comes along (but with a better voice for Deep Thought, hopefully).

So long, and thanks for all the fish.

UPDATE:
Am now on the fourth audiobook of the Narnian chronicles ("The Voyage of the Dawn Treader"), and I'm amazed at how good these books actually are. I thought that I just liked them when I was a kid because, well, I was so young -- but C.S. Lewis is a much better writer than I would have remembered to give him credit for, the story lines themselves are fascinating, and the people that were selected to read these books for the audio versions are all, so far, spot-on (Kenneth Branaugh and Lynn Redgrave are my favorites as yet).