h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

We've ended up with superfluous calendars too, I'm assuming you don't want our spares…?
PH: Things being described as 'multi-purpose' or 'mixed purpose'. You can't buy plain paper without it being labelled as 'Multi-purpose plain paper' and as I was packing away our (fake) over the weekend I noticed the box was labelled '7ft Fir Indoor Use Only Mixed Purpose Christmas Tree'. How many purposes can you mix and match with a Christmas tree, eh? I suppose you could use it as a stage prop, say if you were doing a panto of 'Babes in the Wood' or 'Hansel and Gretel' and you needed trees for a woodland scene, and I've seen some people use little in bird cages for their budgies to sit on. But surely 'Christmas tree' is its purpose? What is mixed about it?

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Could also be a Yule tree, or a Festivus tree, or you could leave it till after Easter.

Festivus has a pole, not a tree.

Well I know that in Turkey, a Muslim country, the is called a 'New Year Tree'. I'd argue that putting decorations on it at the end of the year regardless of whether it is called Yule, Christmas or New Year is the same purpose even if called something different. A by any other name would smell as sweet.

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Conspiracy theorists who are climate change deniers who are trolling on the Met Office Tuesday YouTube live stream and believe that the world is cooling and that we're heading of a mini ice age as well as that there everyone is being lied to by big government and big business.

PH: Films 'based on' a book, or the characters therein, especially if using the book's title for the film. 'Inspired by' or 'loosely based on' is usually the more accurate description. Might still be a good, watchable film, but please don't mislead people.

Watched Alice through the Looking Glass yesterday eve. Having seen Alice in Wonderland (the Johnny Depp one), I had some idea what to expect - but didn't realise the sequel bore almost no resemblance to the book at all!

I've seen both films. The first one shows a grown-up Alice and the characters say that Alice has been there before. So the film has characters from the stories, but doesn't follow either of them. I love the Alice stories and was concerned when I saw that the first was about an older Alice. When I saw it I decided to put my knowledge and love of the stories to one side and take the film on its own merits. It's not a great film, but it's OK. I agree, the films don't tell the Lewis Carroll stories, but would anyone watch them if they were called "Grown-up Alice Goes Back to Wonderland", or "Grown-up Alice Back Through the Looking-glass"?

The films and TV series that really annoy me are ones with titles like "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein" or "Agatha Christie's Marple". The author's name is used to give the impression that the film or series is a close adaptation of the book. A lot of the time, it isn't.

Television series 'Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World' follows the novel for the first two episodes, but the rest is weird and wacky involving time travel, Jack the Ripper, witches, vampires, the post-apocalyptic survivors of a nuclear war, nothing like the book at all.

What I find even worse is when they have a horror film marketed as 'Based on a true story' when it isn't. There are no restrictions against marketing something as 'based on a true story' and then at the end you get the usual credit 'this is a work of fiction, any similarity with actual persons (living or deceased) or events is entirely coincidental'.

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Maybe the true story is just the acknowledgement of the existence of the human race? You can base nearly every movie in existence on that one.

Years ago in French lessons we did a translation that started "Une histoire vraie" - a true story. Our teacher told us that anything that claims to be a true story probably isn't.

I seem to recall that the opening credits for Oliver! say that it's "Loosely based on a story by Charles Dickens", or words to that effect. And yet it's a pretty good adaptation of the story.

I didn't appreciate why screenplay writers sometimes have to change the story till I read The Man in the Iron Mask. None of the adaptations stick to the book (spoiler alert: Louis XIV is not replaced by his twin, most of the musketeers die). I don't know who made the first adaptation of the book but modern audiences are so used to Louis being overthrown and the musketeers coming out on top that I don't think they'd accept an accurate adaptation.

Having said all that, there have been plenty of adaptations where the only connection with the book is the title and one or two characters. These always feel like shameless attempts to cash in on the readership of the book.

_Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency_.

I've seen two adaptations as TV series and neither has any direct relation to the plot of the books. I'm not saying I didn't enjoy both of them, I did, but the only relation they share with the books is the main character's name and some whacky idea what a "holistic detective" is.


As for "based on a true story" stories, the film (and ensuing TV series) _Fargo_(1996) famously lied about being based on a true story. Here's a trivia entry from IMDb:

>>The film is not actually "Based on a true story". Joel Coen & Ethan Coen later admitted that they added that disclaimer so the viewer would be more willing to suspend disbelief in the story. (An urban legend even says that people have gone to search Minnesota for the briefcase of money, and come to a bad end.) While the specific crimes in the movie didn't happen, the plot has elements of two well-known Minnesota crimes. In 1962, a St. Paul attorney named Eugene Thompson hired someone to kill his wife, Carol. Unbeknownst to Thompson, his man hired someone else to do the job. The second man fatally wounded Mrs. Thomspon in her house, but she managed to escape him. She went to a neighbor's house for help while her assailant fled the scene. The sloppiness and brutality of the crime attracted great attention. The murderers were quickly caught and gave up Thompson, who denied knowing anything about the crime for many years afterward. In 1972, Virginia Piper, the wife of a wealthy Orono banker, was kidnapped. A million-dollar ransom was paid, one of the largest in U.S. history. Mrs. Piper was found tied to a tree in a state park. Two men were convicted of the crime, but were acquitted after a re-trial. One of them later went on a shooting spree after his wife left him, killing her, their 5-year-old son, her son from a previous marriage, her new boyfriend, and one of his sons. Only $4,000 of the money was ever recovered.<<

Interesting to see that the musical my daughter performed in recently (Oliver!, in two different adaptations) and the next one she will do (Alice in Wonderland) were mentioned in this thread within a day.
If someone could mention "Shrek, the musical" we have the full set.

Shrek, the Musical had very little in common with the true story it was based upon.

Wasn't that the affair between Charles Dickens and Lewis Carroll?

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There really are ogres?!

This has been a petty hate for other people, too, but clothes sizing has annoyed me today...

I ordered a t-shirt 38in chest and it arrived today as 36in chest so it is too tight. A while ago I ordered a shirt 38in chest and it arrived as 42in chest so it is too baggy...

Today's PH: All the preparation to do a job & clearing up afterwards. I've been painting the kitchen walls, so furniture & curtain rails to be removed first, wash down before starting painting. Then at the end, brushes to wash, tape to remove etc. Then to decide if a second coat is needed....

Yes I find the lack of standardisation in clothes sizes quite irritating and jumping between 16/18 uk to close xxl or other sizes in other places and I have no idea what any of it actually means plus that only really seems to cover width when I also want length and sleeves come in all sorts of mad length, width, fit combinations that can render something unwearable

Don't get me started on clothes sizes! I've had blouses that were the right bust size, but the sleeves would have suited an ape. I've had t-shirts where size L was too snug and size XL in the same brand was "rent-a-tent".

Who thought, 'the only way to sell shirts is by measuring the neck. Nothing else, just the neck. No-one will ever need to know how long someone's arms are, their stomach size, shoulder width, body length etc as long as they can wear a tie…'

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