Reviews

First, I should say that I'm a big Roger Rees fan, which is why I sat all the way through the movie. I thought this film would be about a therapist who was curious about BDSM who goes to a professional dominatrix and winds up falling in love with her as he discovers his true sexuality. But instead this is a confused mess about a kinky therapist who is already involved with a professional dominatrix whom his apparently hip wife has been letting him see for over 2-1/2 years. The characters don't change and no one learns anything. It's just a mess of terrible acting, appalling dialog and a scrambled narration that tries to play leapfrog with the time line to somehow explain who these people are.

In the movie I would have liked to have seen, the Rees' character would ultimately have had to confront whether he could be true to his sexuality and yet stay in his marriage. This is a very real issue that affects hearts and lives every day. Instead, Rees' character is this sniveling, sneaky bastard who takes advantage of his generous, open-minded wife as soon as she leaves the city to write. Any kinky guy who has that kind of good situation going would think twice -- hell, THREE times at least -- before jeopardizing it. Yet Werthman doesn't have his characters reflect at all.

But then, Werthman couldn't possibly have written the film I was expecting to see because, from the character dialog alone, it's clear he doesn't know anything about BDSM psychology or sexuality. It's like he visited a couple of dungeons, went to a butt-wiggling bondage club to eyeball a spanking scene, and then dove into writing the script, ignoring the vast number of informative, well-written books on the subject. The worst part was that he failed to convey that people who practice BDSM are very much aware of the intimacy issues and tend to be very good communicators since they know that what they're doing is potentially dangerous, both physically and emotionally. Werthman had a chance to make a really interesting, insightful film plucked from a complex world. Instead, he blew it.

God, I hope Roger Rees can make a decent film before he dies. I hated seeing his talent wasted on this.

This film is a bloated, plot less wad of pro-life propaganda spewed from the buttocks of the Christian Coalition warhorse. I kid you not, this film is one of the most ridiculous steaming piles of poo I have ever seen. I stuck with it because of Nathan Fillion, whom I loved in Firefly. I thought something interesting might happen because he was in it. I was totally wrong.

I can't figure out how anyone could give this creeping ick a good review. NOTHING HAPPENS in this film. NOTHING. It shambles like a zombie for two painful hours until this woman squirts out a baby five minutes before the end. Suddenly, she grows a spine and dumps her horrific husband; grows some morals and ends her affair; and as luck would have it becomes independent. Oh, and did I mention that if you're nice to rich old men, they'll give you money? Just because you can make a good pie. Mark my words, ladies. If you can cook, a man will look after you.

While some of the dialog is funny and the characters amusing, the messages and themes of the story are appalling.

The writer-director, Adrienne Shelly, was murdered just before the film was finished. I can't help but think all the hoo-ha and awards are pity awards. This bag of junk should never have made it into the can. It's a pity because there was a lot of true talent involved. The actors are not one iota at fault for the lack of direction and plot.

Oh, and most of the pies looked and sounded disgusting. I don't know how that's possible, but they managed it.

After rather brilliant opening credits, the film was choppy in the beginning. Babelfish translation: They really f-ed it up. Until Arthur and Ford actually get picked up by the Starship Heart of Gold, the story is disconnected in places and they use ploys that don't work to shorten setup sequences that ought to have been left alone. (These are the same setup sequences that Douglas Adams never changed himself, regardless of the medium in which he told the story, and there's a reason for that.) So, if you're not intimately familiar with the setup, you could easily get a bit lost. And if you are familiar with it, you'll get annoyed and easily see how some things just don't make sense.

(For example, Ford racing to Arthur's house with a shopping cart of beer and peanuts when he's apparently not aware of the demolition crew. Clearly the shopping cart was an ill-fitting plot ploy to "bypass" the classic exchange between Ford and the construction crew foreman.)

Zaphod, however, makes up for many ills. Even as the movie continues to stumble along like Frankenstein, flexing its new parts stiffly and clumsily (a fan can pretty easily distinguish which parts were Adams' new ones and which were not), the brilliance of Sam Rockwell as Zaphod goes a very long way to keep things entertaining. I loved this Zaphod dearly, almost as much as the original. Also, as they built up the chase to capture Zaphod and the stolen ship (a plot line that Adams should have developed way back when), they employed the Vogons as bad guys, expounding on their bureaucratic foibles in many very funny ways.

The part they handled most deftly was the first half of the visit to Magrathea. Arthur's visit with Slartibartfast to where they manufacture the planets was breathtaking. I felt the heart of the movie here, and found a connection with Arthur that I hadn't had through the entire film. That's not to say that Martin Freeman wasn't really good throughout, but this sequence was his best acted by far. However, I must add that they -- again -- screwed up part of a classic sequence by trying to abbreviate it. As a result, the reason that the mice want Arthur's brain is fuzzily expressed at best.

I can't overlook Stephen Fry and The Book. Not only was his narration flawless, but the animated sequences that went with it were especially funny. And Marvin -- oh, god. Alan Rickman was completely brilliant, as usual.

Still. It was, as I mentioned, clumsy in parts. Really clumsy. The new sequences in the story were so forced at times I wanted to punch someone. I liked the romance between Arthur and Trillian a lot, although Trillian was flat as a character. But I don't especially like how they juggled the detours (except one, which involves Marvin and a lot of Vogons; that was extremely funny and, I suspect, originally from Adams). The movie was only 1 hr and 50 min. They could have left in five or six extra minutes to clarify some points. But, alas. The rating of 7 is because of the humor only.