DVD Review by David Blackwell

DETAILS: 109 minutes, Making Of featurette, deleted scenes, outtakes, Additional Guide entry, Sing Along featurette, Marvin Hangman game, two audio commentaries

STUDIO: Touchstone/Spyglass

RELEASE DATE: 9-13-2005

The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy has been a tale told many times whetehr it has been radio, novel, comic book, TV series, computer game, and now in a movie. Each take has been different in some ways while remaining faithful to the vision of the late Douglas Adams (who wrote 80 percent of the film's screenplay before his untimely passing due to a heart attack). The film is the most fantastic visual representation of teh story so far. It is mind biggling to look at while a few moments will bring smiles to the faces of fans who know THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY from it's earlier versions.

MOVIE Review:   https://enterline2.tripod.com/hitchhikersguide.html

VIDEO: 2.35:1 (Anamorphic Widescreen)

The transfer is fantastic. Colors are vivid while shadow values are good. Image detail is great.

AUDIO: English 5.1 Dolby Digital, English 5.1 DTS, French, Spanish

Subtitles: French, Spanish, English Captions

The audio is stellar. Dialogue is clear while the other sound elements are beautiful. A DTS track is also included.

SPECIAL FEATURES: The selection of extras help make this DVD fun.

The short Making Of featurette is full of info and behind-the-scenes footage. I wish it was longer. That brings us to the three deleted scenes (they should have left the first scene in the film) and two outtakes which are amusing. The additional Guide Entry is also something I wish they could have left in the film somewhere. Next is the Sing Along for the opening credits song "So Long And Thanks For All Fish" which might want you to sing along if you enjoyed it during the film itself. Also you can play Marvin's Hangman game where you have to guess four lettered words and each wrong guess means Marvin loses a body part.

The film has two audio commentaries:

The first is with Director Garth Jennings, Producer Nick Goldsmith, Actor Martin Freeman, and Actor Bill Nighy.

the second commentary features Executive Producer Robie Stamp and Douglas Adams colleague Sean Solle.

I love both commentaries. The second goes into more about the story and provides a few details not gleamed on in the first commenatry (like talk about Douglas Adams and the way he wrote).

But The most brillant extra is the Improbability Drive fuction which you can press and it will take you to a random extra (including a easter egg). I wish more DVDs had this random button function. I do wonder why the button likes to send one to the Sing Along frequently. I do wish the button could take a viewer to a random point in the film itself.

MENUS: I love the way the menu system is structured to look like it is something out of the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Glaxy. The only thing missing is an introduction by the guide itself before you reach the main menu. Minor quibble because the menu system is the way I wanted it to be like for this DVD.

FINAL ANALYSIS: THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO TEH GLAXY is a marvellous DVD. I hope they come up with a out-of-this-world two disc collector's edition one of these days (and the sequel to this movie).

this DVD Review is (c)9-9-2005 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted (except for exceprts and the link back to this review). Look for additional content (and updates) at http://www.livejournal.com/users/enterlinemedia and send any comments to lord_pragmagtic@hotmail.com