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

Patches - 'what is stopping us from accepting that a movie should go on for 8-12 hours?' - I don't know how much it would cost to make a film lasting that long, and probably more important, what cinema would show one? The first Saturday it came out, the local multiplex cinema had 31 showings (solidly booked as far as I can tell). How much would you have to pay for a ticket to make up for the cinemas to make the same income? Once you've seen it, you may think it's just the right length. I'm with Gnomon on this one.

TC, Miranda Richardson wasn't like the Rita Skeeter I imagined either, however it didn't take long for me to adjust. The teeth were perfect! Robbie Coltrane and Dawn French - yes, they would be good together. As for Serenity, do go to see it and let me know what you thought. As I was already a convinced fan, I couldn't see it with the eyes of someone new to the characters. I agree that Filch looked silly in one part of this film - takes away a bit from his fairly dark character. Did you think that Prof McGonagall looked silly? I'm tempted to ask where, but it might count as a spoiler.

Zube, we'll have to see if the DVD contains more scenes.

Gnomon - I've not seen 'The Accidental Tourist'. As TC also recommends it, I'm interested to know more.

will c the movie when it comes out (obviously), but imagine if the theatres only had full book (nothing left out) versions only. the price would probably be sufficient to cover the expenses, but would be like a monopoly where the customer doesn't know any better.

Films are still considered to be something that you see in one go at a cinema. Nobody would consider reading a normal book in one sitting. That's why books get away with being 10 hours, or 20 hours or 40 long, which films are limited to about 3 hours. Perhaps if people watched films the way they read books, in dribs and drabs, on the train to work, for ten minutes during coffee, for an hour before they went to bed, then the style of film could change to a longer format.

good point.

Z - I recommend all of Anne Tyler's books very highly. There's a summary of them here: http://www.answers.com/topic/anne-tyler



As for films as long as the book - for that, we have serialisations,
(althought even they have to miss bits out)

The kind of technology may come where we can watch a film instead of reading a book, as Gnomon describes. But it's not the same. The 2 hour cinema show is an event. You can't make a nice evening out, followed by a meal together if you both just sit and read a book. Or take a bunch of kids for a treat, or have a family outing. It's not the same, is it?

There are people who are extremely good at using language and writing and they give many people pleasure just by choosing rich-sounding words to describe a landscape, a room, a person, or what's going on inside someone's head. This can only be enjoyed by reading it quietly to yourself. All this would be lost if we *only* had the medium of marathon film.

I'm not sure if that's what you're pleading for.

who said i was pleading for it. all i wanted was for some1 else to notice how weird the concept, that i believe is weird, is.

and on that note, how weird is the spelling of the word weird?
how much odder does it look when spelt: wierd.

"what is stopping us from accepting that a movie should go on for 8-12 hours?"

Quite a lot of practical considerations!

I'm very keen on opera, and have been to a number of performances of very long works. And there's always an interval--longer operas will usually be shown with at least two intervals: with something thats over 4 hours, you're better off if one of the intervals is long enough to have a meal, not just a drink. So opera houses and concert halls have huge lobby and bar spaces, to fit the whole audience during the interval. Most people need to get up and stretch their legs, and move around for a while--think of how many people dread long-distance air travel because they're going to be stuck in one seat for 8 hours or more.

If the performance is really long, you have all kinds of problems of getting away from work: I went to a Wagner concert where I had to leave at 5.15 pm to get to the concert hall in time for a 6 pm start; two intervals, one long enough to have dinner, finish at midnight, home at 12.30--it was quite an experience, but there's no way I'd do that on a regular basis. If even dedicated enthusiasts find a session like that tough going, there's no way a general audience would put up with it. The level of concentration required is difficult to maintain for that length of time.

The obvious answer to making something that takes 8 or 9 hours is to make it into a serial, as TV has been doing for years. It's interesting that since Lord of the Rings, the idea of making serial films rather than self-contained ones seems to have become more feasible--the other examples I can think of are Kill Bill, which seems to have succesful as a two-parter and the 2nd and 3rd Matrix films, which were less so.

Azara

Thanks for the link, TC.

Have you seen the film yet, Azara? What did you think?

There is sometimes the option of hearing a book, either on tape, CD or via a website like http://www.audible.com (I have a monthly subscription to this).

I've seen the film, ZSF, and I thought it was great! I thought most of the editing decisions they made were good ones: things like dropping the house-elves and having Neville get the gillyweed instead of Dobby tightened up the whole plot. Brnedan Gleeson was great as Mad-Eye Moody; Ralph Fiennes was great as Voldemort.

Cedric was attractive enough to make much more of an impact in the film than I remember from the book--it made his death much more affecting. When the book came out, there'd been a lot of hoop-la about a character dying--when it turned out it was "only" Cedric, that was a bit of a let-down. I t certainly didn't come across like that in the film.

Looking back, the only thing I was a bit disappointed in was that Fleur was presented as very much the weakest of the champions: in the book, Beauxbatons was a co-ed school, and she was still the champion, while the description of the first task made her seem competent, and the whole Veela thing gave her a stronger interest. Given that a lot of people complain that Rowling doesn't have enough strong female characters, I thought that weakening Fleur in the film was a pity.

With Umbridge and Tonks and Bellatrix Lestrange in the next one, there are more interesting female characters coming up!

Azara

I agree entirely with your comments about Fleur, Azara! I too was disappointed that the portrayal of Fleur. And yes, it will be interesting to see who plays Bellatrix and Umbridge ... and Tonks, who I think is a really interesting character. And of course, we'll see more of Mad-Eye Moody in the future. I can't remember how much we see of Voldemort in the next book. I'm re-reading it to little at the moment.

I've been wondering about Tonks - who will play her, I mean.

Will Mike Newell be directing the next one?

Yes, I wonder who the contenders might be to play Tonks. Let's recap. She has a rather dishevelled appearance, is reasonably young and has had a hard time of it. All the people I can think of are just a bit on the old side.

As to Mike Newell - I hope so, he's made a good job of this one.

Tonks is almost completely irrelevant to book 5, so she will be omitted to keep the movie short. Pity!

Yes, you're right really. She does make a big impression,though. - and I was already suggesting that Pink would be a suitable candidate for the part: http://www.pinkspage.com/photo/index.html

Never heard of her, TC, although on a quick peek, she definitely looks interesting. Tell me more!

She's just very self-assured and has some very intersting songs. She's very rude in interviews but I still think she's great fun. She's about 23 so she'd be the right age. On another thread, though, some people are making some good alternative suggestions. Another challenging one to cast will be Luna Lovegood.

Hmm, I couldn't really remember much about Luna Lovegood apart from the name. A quick search reveals some interesting stuff: http://www.hp-lexicon.org/wizards/luna.html

http://www.diagonlane.com/articles/luna

There's even a fan-listing for the relationship between Luna and Neville Longbottom: http://duckness.org/nevillexluna/ - interestingly, there's one for the relationship between Kaylee and Simon - http://www.javascrypt.com/spike-o-rama/kayleesimon/ - guess people just love the idea of romance.

Both I and Daniel Radcliffe believed that Harry would marry Luna eventually. That was before it was revealed in Book 6 that (spoiler below)



















































He is madly in love with Ginny!

Gosh, I don't remember this! I'll have to re-read it!