All language subtitles for The.Hitchhikers.Guide.to.the.Galaxy.2005.720p.BluRay.H264.AAC-RARBG

Hi, I'm Robbie.

And welcome to our ramble through
The Hitchhiker and Douglas memories.

And I'm Sean and, yeah, let's
see if we can stay on target. [chuckles]

[male narrator]
It's an important and popular fact

that things are not always...

[Robbie] One of the things I've always
loved about the way this movie starts

is starting with those lines,
"Things are not always what they seem."

If you were gonna sum up
Douglas's brilliant capacity

to change perspective on things,

that line really encapsulates it all,
I think.

[Sean] I think it's great as well that,

when you've got the titles
on the screen,

there's the dolphins
crying in the background

before anything actually starts.

[narrator] ...as amusing attempts to
punch footballs or whistle for tidbits.

So they eventually decided they
would leave Earth by their own means.

The last ever dolphin message
was misinterpreted

as a sophisticated attempt to do
a double backward somersault

through a hoop,
whistling The Star-Spangled Banner.

In fact, the message was this:

– [bell dings]
– "So long and thanks for all the fish."

[Robbie] One of the things
that struck me so fantastically

about Garth as a director

is that he described this sequence to me
very early on in the whole process,

saying he wanted to do a big
Busby Berkeley number at the beginning,

which was going to be familiar,

so you were getting
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy,

but you were gonna be seeing it his way.

I think it sort of settles people down
but gives them a fabulous opening.

[Sean] It's a superb piece of music.
I've had it going round in my head,

being a huge fan of
The Divine Comedy anyway.

Just the way it starts with this
tub-thumping, menacing, alien...

"We're gonna have something
really impressive here,"

and then suddenly,
this left turn into this fantastic,

Monty Python-style musical number.

I was just hooting
when I saw this the first time.

[Robbie] Of course, the key thing
about this whole song

is that we recorded
the soundtrack for this

at Abbey Road Studios.

Of all the moments which I missed
Douglas most on the entire shoot,

it was the day we recorded this song.

Because there we were,
Douglas one of the great Beatle fans,

and he would have been so, so delighted
that we were there recording this song

at the home, the spiritual home.

[girl solo]
♪ If I had just one last wish

♪ I would like a tasty fish

[Sean] I think one of the very
first times at The Digital Village,

where Douglas and Robbie and I
worked together,

Douglas would always come scooting
into the software developers' office.

The one thing that could be guaranteed
to bring him to a screeching halt

was an obscure Beatles CD on my desk,

or on anyone's desk.

So we played a bit of a game,

which was making up pretend sleeves and
putting them inside CD cases. [laughs]

– [Robbie] Was he caught out?
– Just once.

[Robbie laughs]
You got him just the once.

[male chorus]
♪ So long, so long, so long

[female chorus]
♪ So long, so long, so long

[whole chorus] ♪ So long, so long
and thanks for all the fish d

[male narrator] The extraordinary story
of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

begins very simply.

It begins with a man.

[Robbie] This is all in a real house,
which we found...

– It's near where you live, isn't it?
– [Sean] About 20 minutes down the road.

[Robbie] And just perfect.

An Earth man, to be precise...

[Robbie] There's the first
major tea reference. [chuckling]

Tea cup bouncing along.

His name is Arthur Dent.

He is a five-foot-eight-inch-tall
ape descendant,

and someone is trying to drive
a bypass through his house.

[Robbie] And the bulldozers. There were
a lot of bulldozers. Slight overkill.

[Sean] One of the things
over the mobile phone,

of course in the original
radio and TV series and the books,

there was the reference to people
being so amazingly primitive

they thought digital watches were neat.
For the computer game,

which was the last thing we at The
Digital Village worked on with Douglas,

Douglas actually approved the change
from digital watch to mobile phone.

So, uh, yes.

On display?
I had to go down to a cellar.

Mr Dent, have you any idea how much
damage this bulldozer would suffer

if I just let it roll straight over you?

– How much?
– None at all.

[Robbie] OK,
here comes Mos, um, as Ford.

Just notice the Cottington sign go past,
Arthur's village, a little detail.

We've got lots and lots of those kinds
of small details in the movie.

[Sean] You spot the Cottington
Council logo on the vans as well.

Here.

There you are.

Eat, drink. We gotta talk.

Now's not the best time.
They're going to demolish my home.

Whoa! You already...
You already know? How?

What do you...?

Oh, they, they? When you say
"they" you mean they? Got it.

Listen. I got somethin' important
I gotta tell you. Right now.

Well, what about my house?

Workers of the Earth,
I bring good tidings of peanuts...

[Sean] That "what
about my house?" line...

There's the "Cottington Council."

One of the things people complained
most about the old Infocom game

is that there's a rumor that
Arthur saying, "What about my house?"

is essential
to get past a certain point.

It's not true. You don't have to say it.

But people believe that is the key line
to move on the adventure,

– and it's not true.
– [chuckles]

[Robbie] Now, the famous pub scene.
The woman sitting on the bar stool

appeared in the stage version
of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

We didn't know that when she came
for her casting. She played Trillian.

I'll come clean on this.
He asked for bitter,

and I know that Mos is drinking lager.

So before anybody writes in
and freezes their frame,

that was a pint of lager he just learned
how to down but rather impressively.

That's the first example, you saw
Mos wiping his mouth with his towel.

Mos, as an actor, discovered
so many things to do with his towel,

a man who knows where his towel is.

Watch how he's laced using his towel
the whole way through the movie.

I was from a small planet somewhere
in the vicinity of Betelgeuse?

[Sean] The way he pulls it out from
under his jacket as if it's normal.

[Robbie] Now, car coming up. This is...
Have a look at the car.

That is a Ford Prefect car.

[laughing] We found the Ford Prefect
lovers' sort of association,

and they gave us
one of their cars for the filming.

I assumed you were drunk.

I thought cars were the dominant
life form. I was introducing myself.

You saved my life. And now
I'm saving yours. Please drink.

It must be Thursday. I could
never get the hang of Thursdays.

[Robbie] That line, when Martin
delivered it on the audition tape,

made me absolutely certain
that we'd found our Arthur.

Just sort of sensational.

– [Ford] Who's he?
– [Arthur] She. Tricia McMillan.

[Robbie] Little bit of alien joke there,
really, he's still not quite there.

This was the first day of filming,
April 19th.

The book he's reading there is
The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins,

acknowledged to be one of Douglas's
great intellectual mentors,

that and The Blind Watchmaker.

The other joke is Trillian
arriving as Darwin,

with a beagle under her arm,

which is another nod for Douglas
and his love of evolution.

You're the first to get that right.

– Really?
– Yes. Everyone calls me Santa.

– Right
– I thought the beagle was a giveaway.

So did I.

People at these parties
are drunken idiots.

What?

All these people are idiots. God.

[Sean laughs] Every time...

– [Robbie] Every time it's good.
– [Sean] Every time.

That's awkward.

[Arthur] Tell me.

She was amazing though, Ford.

[Robbie] Again, on the set at Elstree.
sugar mouse, Indian chiefs,

still our first day of filming,
we got a lot done the first day.

[both laugh]

[Sean] I just absolutely
love this scene.

It's the first time,
really, that we've seen

Arthur and Trillian meeting
each other properly, all expanded.

You can see why...

[chuckling]
Why Arthur's so upset about...

– [Robbie] About losing her.
– [Sean] Exactly.

[Robbie] It's important to say,

this was an area of the movie
that Douglas was working on himself.

The radio series hints very strongly
at the beginnings of this romance

and it gets lost through other versions.

[Sean] Absolutely, yeah...

Um, when Trillian first meets
Arthur in the radio series,

Trillian apologizes
for missing the lunch date.

She was in a black hole
all day or something.

And gradually, that was toned down
through the books, the TV series.

So it's great to see it
being punched back up again.

[Robbie] Douglas was working on it.

He knew he needed
more character development

and through-story for a movie
as opposed to radio and books.

[Sean] It's all very well to say that
Trillian is a brilliant astrophysicist,

but what better way
than to actually show it?

I think this is such a marvelous scene,

and it's obvious they're
completely getting each other.

[Robbie] Absolutely.
And that lovely joke,

he did get the fact that she'd
come as Darwin and nobody else had.

That was a moment
of intelligence and connection

which was there in the script
as well as the acting.

And here he comes.

Of course, Cornwall.

[man] Hey, excuse me.

[Robbie] The sunglasses in this movie
are all made by Nick Goldsmith's dad,

Oliver Goldsmith,

who made the sunglasses
for the original TV series.

I'm from a different planet.

It's true.
You want to see my spaceship?

[Tricia laughs]

"Do you want to see my spaceship?"
What kind of chat-up line is that?

Mm, that does happen.

– Speaking of...
– [beeping]

[Robbie] I love the barman.

Drink up.

– [rumbling]
– That's my house.

People of Earth, a round of drinks,
for everyone, on me.

You really think
the world's going to end?

Yes.

Shouldn't we lie down, or put a paper
bag over our heads, or something?

– If you like.
– Will it help?

Not at all. See you.

Last orders, then.

[Robbie laughs] We re-shot that scene
because of the way that Mos was running,

but in the end we decided
that's the way Mos ran,

he wasn't trying to be funny
with his run.

– [workman 1] What is that?
– [workman 2] Run!

– [workman 3] Look out!
– [shouts and screams]

[Robbie] There's a nice moment,
where one of the...

A guy we did a lot of close-ups for,

one of the builders, they're real
builders, with an enormous belly,

and one of them stumbles.
There he goes, he falls over.

Not scripted.

[rumbling]

[Robbie] Look for
the details coming up,

"Dolphins vanish" on The Times,
the story of the dolphins vanishing.

Notice what Ford's doing,
he's picking up his towel.

Another example the way
we've laced the use of the towel

through the whole movie.

[Sean laughing] I love the fact that
they've demolished Arthur's house

and Ford just runs through the rubble
like it's completely reasonable.

– Find the bathroom.
– [Robbie] That's right.

He knows what he's doing.

Um, People of Earth,
this is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz...

[Sean] We should start talking about
the scene that's about to come up.

That's one Saturday morning,
bright and sunny Saturday morning,

in London,
just outside Moorgate Tube Station...

...four of us from The Digital Village
and Douglas's family

were all there to...

I love this scene here with the sheep.

[Robbie] The sheep are being attracted
by sheep nuts, that's what's happening.

[Vogon Jeltz]
The plans have been on display

at your local planning office
in Alpha Centauri for 50 Earth years.

[Robbie] You've got Douglas's family
running across the street.

The woman staying calm
while the world's going nuts around her

is Jan, Douglas's mum.

The only bit of subtitle
in the whole movie.

[zapping]

[Arthur screams]

[Sean] I love this. I love the fact
that their hitching device

has become, in 25 years,
miniaturized down to a ring.

Fantastic.

[Robbie] When my daughter
read the book for the first time,

the line... And Sean,
correct me if I misquote it.

...about the Vogon ships
hanging in the air...

The Vogon ships hanging in the air
in the way that a brick doesn't.

That was the line that she loved.

We wanted to keep the explosion
underwhelming.

The famous moment. I was asked
this question more than any other:

Were we gonna have the music?

And it's a great moment
where it finally kicks in.

[Sean] Even now,
I am just already tingling.

The moment when
those first chords arrive.

It's sacrilege,
talking over the top of it.

Brilliant, brilliant story
about the theme music.

Again, going back to the computer game
version of The Hitchhiker's Guide.

We had enormous trouble.
Obviously, we had to have...

Everybody asked, "Does it have the
tune?" This is the Hitchhiker's theme.

Poor old Eagles, they've got this
absolutely marvelous piece of music.

Everyone knows it
as the Hitchhiker's Guide theme.

We had enormous problems
getting the rights for it.

Except, obviously, Douglas just
seemed to know absolutely everybody.

And it just took one phone call
from Sophie, who was Douglas's PA,

to the Eagles, and they went, "Yeah,
you can use it, no problem at all."

[Robbie] I'm very glad
we've got it in the movie too.

[Sean] I love this, this is so clever,

using the female and male as some of...
where God went wrong.

[laughing] I love that.

This is the thing that really,
really blows me away about the film.

There's so much stuff behind...

Not even behind the scenes,
it's right in front of you.

Clever, clever references,
taking Douglas's ideas,

and transforming them into...
really into what you see on the screen.

You're laughing at things
and for long-time Hitchhiker's fans

it's kind of, "Oh, wow!"

You obviously, clearly get it.

So you're not from Guildford?

Which would explain the accent,
which I've always wondered about.

You're not an out-of-work actor,

but rather a writer for this...
this book thing.

Good, huh?

[Robbie] A lot of discussion
about the design of the book.

We didn't go very high-tech with it.
We've deliberately gone retro.

It's a book you could put in your pocket
and take round the galaxy with you.

The Guide graphics
are meant to have a universal theme.

Um... And here they are
in the Vogon washroom.

[Sean] There's two great things here.

First we see Ford whipping his towel out
and using it to solve a problem.

But the other brilliant thing is...

Douglas was always
asked questions by fans.

"Why did you do particularly do this?
And why did you do the other?"

And I'm pretty sure one of them was,

"If they've got the
electronic thumb for hitchhiking,

why didn't they hitchhike off
the Vogon ship, pick up a passing ship?"

So we see this absolutely
fantastic reference here.

Ford's using his towel,
we're not quite sure what he's doing,

and the great thing is that
he's just doing this in the background.

And the absolutely
brilliant thing about it,

as we'll see when he and Arthur

manage to pop one of these pipes on,

of course, they're deep
in the bowels of the ship,

and to get a signal
from the electronic thumb...

For the electronic thumb, rather,
to pick up a signal.

Just like with a mobile phone,

if you're inside a metal box
you're not gonna get any reception.

There you go, Ford points the thumb up

inside one of the pipes
to get an outside signal.

They want to get off this ship
as quickly as possible.

[Robbie] That's a good example of trying
to sort of deal with those issues

that fans had been sort of vexed about.

[Sean] "You're wrong!" [laughs]

[Guide] Not evil, but bad-tempered,
bureaucratic, officious and callous.

They wouldn't even lift a finger
to save their own grandmothers

from the Ravenous Bug blatter Beast
of Traal without orders

signed in triplicate,
sent in, sent back,

queried, lost, found,
subjected to public inquiry,

lost again and finally buried
in soft peat for three months

and recycled as firelighters.

[Sean] Stephen just absolutely fantastic
as the voice of the Guide, there.

This little scene here, where we get
this absolutely classic Guide entry,

at one of the very early
screenings of this, I believe...

Actually, sorry, I'm lying.
At the premiere,

the chap sitting next to me was,
I believe, one of TDV's accountants.

And that was the moment when I knew
the movie worked because here he was,

reciting the lines from that
Guide entry, very quietly beside me.

I thought, he's obviously a fan
who's absolutely loving this.

[both] The Babel fish.

[Robbie] The Babel fish,
one of the iconic things.

[Arthur gibbers]

[Vogon] We have unwittingly picked up
a couple of hitchhikers.

The fish is translating for you.

[Guide] The Babel fish is small,
yellow, leech-like...

[Robbie] With Douglas... This was one
of those plot devices, wasn't it?

It's a classic example
of Douglas solving a problem

with a brilliantly clever plot device.

[Sean] It's always one
of these things...

It's also Douglas slightly sticking
his tongue out at science fiction.

You either have a complicated
electronic translating device,

which is ludicrous,
it's never gonna work,

or you just go, "Well, aliens
all speak English, don't they?"

And the Babel fish,
as the solution to that,

I think it's probably the iconic thing
to come out of The Hitchhiker's Guide.

– [Vogon 1] Someone's coming.
– [Vogon 2] Here we go. Look lively.

[door rumbles]

[Robbie] Now, lots of...

Lots and lots of students operating...
[laughs] Operating these Vogons here.

– Now, talk about the deer.
– [Sean] Absolutely, yeah...

– [Robbie] And the crabs.
– [Sean] The deer and the crabs.

The original entry
on the Vogons' home planet, Vogsphere,

the silky-eyed deers and
the beautiful, jeweled, scuttling crabs

are evolution trying to make up for
the fact that they produced the Vogons.

Unfortunately, what the Vogons do
is catch the deer and sit on them.

They're no good for transport,
they break their backs,

but the Vogons sat on them anyway,
so the fact they've become seats here...

[Robbie] It's a real seat
that he's sitting on.

The crabs make a number of appearances.

There's a "crabs getting smashed" theme
through the movie.

[clang]

[whoosh]

[brakes grind]

[feedback]

[Sean] Poor broken-backed deer.

[Vogon Jeltz groans]

"O freddled gruntbuggly..."

No, really, you don't have to read.

We've put you through
enough trouble already.

"...as plerdled gabbleblotchits
on a lurgid bee."

[Guide] Vogon poetry is widely accepted
as the third worst in the universe.

The second worst
is that of the Azgoths of Kria.

During a recitation by their
Poet Master, Grunthos the Flatulent,

of his poem Ode
to a Small Lump of Green Putty

I Found in my Armpit
One Midsummer Morning,

four of his audience died
of internal hemorrhaging,

and the president of the
Mid-Galactic Arts Nobbling Council

survived by gnawing
one of his own legs off.

[Robbie] Literally, Mos would go
to sleep between takes on this.

Martin was, "This is horrible!"

Mos would catnap, literally,
with all the rubber bands.

He would just turn off
and snooze in between this scene

as he was being tortured with poetry.

Yeah.

[Vogons chortle]

So, Earthlings,
I present you with a choice.

Either die in the vacuum of space...

[Robbie] Now we get Douglas
the English graduate,

in Arthur's response, don't we?

A... a... actually, I rather liked it.

– [Jeltz] Hmm?
– [Ford] Yeah.

That's good. Run with it.

Some of the words I didn't understand,

but I found the imagery quite effective.

Continue.

[Arthur] Well, yes, interesting...

[Robbie] There are not many
big Hollywood movies

where you're getting
discussions like that

in front of a nine-foot-tall beast.

[Arthur] Sorry. Vogonity

of the poet's soul.

So, what you're saying is,

I write poetry because

underneath this mean,
callous, heartless exterior,

I just want to be loved?

[whispers] Yes, yes, yes. Yes.

Yes, yeah...

[Sean] I think that whole scene
just works so absolutely brilliantly...

...in the movie, with the little
emotional music in the background.

Again, if you don't know
The Hitchhiker's,

it's Douglas kind of poking fun
at the whole kind of,

"Oh, winning over the Vogon!"

And no. Out they go.

Shut up. Get a job.
Wash your filthy hands.

Don't panic. Don't panic.

So this is it?
We're gonna die?

Yeah, we're gonna die.

[Robbie] Mos and Martin did
the upcoming stunt for this themselves.

It's a real stunt.
There's nothing CG about this.

They're in a set which has been built,
and what's about to happen to them.

I love the way that,
again, there's the towel.

A little sort of gentleness,
genuine little bit of affection really.

And they're about
to be thrown into space

'cause they don't know
that they're going to get rescued.

This is a Garth joke, this one.

– Would you like a hug?
– No.

[alarm blaring]

[banging, hissing]

Onto a lot of boxes.

[Guide] "Space," says the introduction
to The Hitchhiker's Guide,

"is big. Really big."

"You just won't believe how vastly,
hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is."

[Robbie] The story
of the Improbability Drive,

how Douglas came up with the idea of
the ship and the Improbability Drive,

again, it was another
plot resolution moment, wasn't it?

[Sean] Exactly. They got to the end
of that episode and it was,

"They're thrown into space,
how do they get rescued?"

– Is this a real telephone number?
– [Robbie] No, it's not.

It was gonna be, but that was one thing
we couldn't get sorted out in time.

But Douglas had wanted
an improbable resolution,

that's how he came up
with the Improbability Drive.

That's another interesting thing.

Modern thinking about parallel universes
and string theory,

and Douglas has a ship going through
every parallel universe at the same time

and chooses its re-entry point.

[Sean] It's spooky. There was
an article exactly on that

in New Scientist
about a week before filming started.

[Robbie]
He's referenced all over the place.

So much for the laws of physics...
as we understand them.

[both scream]

This is one of the key scenes
that we decided to...

...to make happen off screen,
if you like.

So we get the story as a newscast

rather then turning it into
a great big enormous set piece.

That was one of the changes
we did make from Douglas's last draft,

to shorten this scene
and make it happen off-screen.

But interestingly, putting it right
back as it was in the radio series.

...and I'm taking the ship
with me. Whoo!

Come on.

– [Sean] Oh... Starbix.
– Right, Starbix.

Talk about Starbix, the cereal there.

[Sean] The brand name Starbix
was made up for the TV series.

You don't find it in the radio series,
books, no reference.

Watch the TV series and see
the Guide entry it's talking about.

[woman on TV] Kavula is best
remembered for his slanderous...

[Robbie] Gag Halfrunt. Destined to make
a bigger appearance in sequels,

if we get that far.
Zooey Deschanel's boyfriend, in fact.

[chuckling]
He worked very hard on that scene.

Genuinely worked very hard. I'm not
taking that lightly, he did a great job.

Hey, hey, hey, hey. What d'you...?

– I was just watching myself.
– We have a couple of hitchhikers.

Hitchhikers?
Why'd you pick up hitchhikers?

I didn't. The ship did.

[Zaphod] What? Wh... wh... Say what?

When we engaged the
Improbability Drive... The big button.

– [Zaphod] I know.
– They were picked up here,

in sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha.
Wait. That's where you picked me up.

– On Earth.
– That's impossible.

– No, just very improbable.
– Listen. I don't have time for this.

We've got the police of half the galaxy
after us. We've stopped for hitchhikers.

So ten out of ten for style, but...

...minus several million
for good thinking.

You're too gorgeous, baby, stop it.
You drive me crazy.

Don't. I'll send Marvin.

[Robbie] Iconic Marvin.

– Marvin.
– [whirring]

[Marvin] You ought to know,
I'm feeling very depressed.

Well, we have something
that should take your mind off things.

[Marvin] It won't work. I have
an exceptionally large mind.

Yeah, we know. But we need you
to go down to the number two entry bay

and pick up our stowaways
and bring them up here.

[Marvin] Just that? I won't enjoy it.

Yeah, well, that's life.

[Robbie] On the nose cone,

you've got the story of the invention
of the Improbability Drive.

It took an artist four months to create

and features lots of people
involved in making the movie.

At the top of the whole thing
is Douglas himself.

This table here is actually...

Those are all hyperspace expressways,
effectively, on the table,

so just think freeways in space.

That actually is a map
of our solar system, and our galaxy.

Hold your position, captain,
until clearance is granted.

[captain on radio] Yes, sir.

That Vogon language
is actually Pitman's shorthand,

so if you know shorthand, every item,

the insignia on the uniforms,

is readable,
you could translate everything.

[Sean] It's absolutely brilliant

that we're focusing on
the Vogons' obsession with bureaucracy.

They use shorthand
to be more efficient,

and yet for representing their numbers,

they draw vertical lines
and then cross off every fifth one,

so just for all numbers.

[Robbie] It takes them
a long, long time.

I think that door just sighed.

We've got the serious cybernetics,
the GPP stuff.

[Marvin] All the doors
have been programmed

to have a cheerful
and sunny disposition.

[Sean] Discussion on the Internet
when they saw Marvin holding that gun.

– "Was that the Point-of-View Gun?"
– [Robbie] Yes.

There he is. He does have
a brain the size of a planet.

That was one of the key design features

that Garth and the production team
wanted to focus on.

And the eyes. Talk about the eyes.
They're straight from the book as well.

[Sean] Absolutely, yes. It was always
triangular eyes for Marvin.

The great thing about Marvin is that...

...and he's managed to do it
particularly well here,

is that he wasn't
designed to be miserable.

He's just got a very miserable,
sulky, depressed personality,

and so he makes himself
look sulky like that.

If he just sat up properly,
he'd look like a proper robot.

[Robbie] Warwick Davis, inside the suit,
worked incredibly hard.

That suit weighed only 20 pounds
less than his entire body weight,

the actor who was inside the suit.

One of the first things that
Sam and Mos did when they met

was invent this little greeting dance
and ritual that they're about to do.

We've just seen two more
uses of the towel there,

holding it up as a defensive shield,

– Zaphod?
– Ford.

[Zaphod] Is that you? Ford.
Praxibetel Ix!

What the hell are you doing here?

I just stuck out my thumb and here I am.

– [Zaphod] That is so you.
– [Ford] Look at you!

President of the Galaxy.
I can't believe you beat Humma Kavula.

You zarkin' frood.

I want you to meet a friend.
Arthur, this is Zaphod Beeblebrox.

President of the Galaxy. This is my
cousin. He's a semi-half brother...

– We share three of the same mothers.
– We've met.

Have we? I'm sorry.
I've got a terrible memory for species.

This is him, Ford.

[Sean] It's again one of those
absolutely classic Douglas-y moments.

You go to a party, you meet someone
you've just met earlier

at another party or something,
then somebody else turns up,

how improbable is that?
Bingo. Right, OK,

that's now an effect
of the Infinite Improbability Drive.

Would you excuse us
for a second, please?

You went down on that little planet
and didn't call me?

Sorry, I didn't know.
I had a galaxy to run.

[Arthur] Hi, Tricia McMillan, right?

I think he called you Trillian.
Which of us got the right one?

I shortened it.
Something a little more spacey.

Right. I was thinking
of changing mine to,

I don't know, Arthoolia.

[laughs] That's a good one.
Well, this is weird.

– How'd you get here?
– I just stuck out my thumb.

– Right. In your pajamas?
– I was in a hurry.

OK. Did you know I was here?

Don't flatter yourself.
I've got a spaceman too.

Yeah, that's kinda
like the Dingo Shuffle, yeah.

[Robbie] Sam,
"Kinda like the Dingo Shuffle."

We prepared a list of swear words
for him at one stage

and dingoes and kidneys feature quite
largely in Zaphod's swearing lexicon.

[Sean] It's funny explaining to clients,
a phone call in the middle of a meeting,

"Quick, we need
a Hitchhiker's swear word."

[Robbie] I made a lot of calls to you
during the making of the movie.

So the head. This was an idea that
Douglas and Jay Roach came up with,

as the way of dealing
with the second head,

a throwaway line for the radio series.

Creating two heads on the radio
is not a problem.

So they decided anatomically
to sit it there...

...under his chin.

Douglas did a lot of work to create
two distinct characters for the head.

If you look back
to the radio series or the books,

the lines they speak
are pretty interchangeable,

but we worked hard
to make them different

and give the two things
a different character.

[Sean] Douglas was always
starting with a simple idea

and then expanding it and re-working it.

[Robbie] Like a great jazz saxophonist,
the way he could riff on ideas,

and like jazz music,
just develop the themes.

[Sean] It starts as a throwaway joke.

It works well on the radio
having the two heads, ha-ha,

and then you get, you know...

[Robbie] That was a huge intellectual
challenge that he enjoyed,

as he made Hitchhiker's
cross from each of the media.

He talked a lot about this, didn't he?

He was as fascinated by the constraints
of the medium as by its possibilities,

always wanting to find the rhythms
and things that would work

on radio, in a book,
or indeed to make it work as a movie.

Another example
of the character development

he was trying to give the movie,

giving the two heads
distinct characteristics.

[Sean] It's one of these key things,

with Douglas at Footlights
at Cambridge doing standup comedy,

one of the things
good standup comedians do

is re-working stuff, trying it out,
trying a new idea.

For Douglas, it was fantastic.
The different versions

were another opportunity
to try another twist on it.

[Robbie] When he was writing, he often
liked to write with an audience,

have somebody in the room
reading what he'd been writing.

He'd read it out
and get an instant response,

performance writing really.

...hyperspace authorization?

– No, commander.
– Oh.

Notice the little emergency exit
sign there, on the door.

– [messenger] I'm coming, sir.
– [footsteps]

[Sean] We've got beautiful contrast,
with horrible, grimy Vogon and then...

[Robbie] Aha. Pan-Galactic Gargle
Blasters. Sean, tell me.

Another pretty iconic thing.

[Sean] Absolutely.
Invented by Zaphod himself,

and there's a huge great list, actually
there's a "how to make it" in the Guide.

That's the kind of thing the Guide has,
how to make really good drinks.

[Robbie] Very useful.

Now there are dozens of Gargle
Blaster recipes on the Internet,

you can make them back here on Earth.

[Guide] ...Gargle Blaster, the effect
of which is like having your brains

smashed out by a slice of lemon...

[Robbie laughs] I love
the scream that these two do.

[both scream]

– Belgium. Hold it one second.
– Belgium.

[Sean] The sun deck.

[Robbie] Did you notice the little
Belgium reference there as well?

It's the swear word
that Ford uses throughout the movie.

Do you want to explain
how Belgium came about?

[Sean] Yeah, Belgium is the most
offensive swear word in the galaxy.

You're not allowed to use it
at all, anywhere.

It came about because...

There's a Guide entry in the books
about this, which Douglas made up.

He used a very offensive Anglo-Saxon
word in the British edition of the book.

The American publisher said,
"You can't have that."

So Douglas changed it to Belgium
and put in a Guide entry

explaining why Belgium was
the most offensive word in the galaxy.

[Robbie] Another example of Douglas
developing ideas, taking it forward.

Tea. Another tea reference.
Well, something that resembles tea.

Poor old Arthur is about to discover
it isn't really a cup of tea at all.

[Sean] One of the driving forces
of the movie.

Spookily, just going off
on a little tangent,

we were having tea
before we sat down to do this,

I spilled tea all over the desk and we
were complaining about rubbish teapots.

The teapot right at the beginning,
in Arthur's house,

is a Brown Betty. It's
a 300-year-old classic design,

and the only teapot
in the world that pours.

It's a 300-year-old design that works

and yet people have changed it
and tweaked it and so on...

And it's just astounding really that...

Douglas had this thing,
I don't think he actually made it up,

about the definition of technology
as something that doesn't work yet.

One of the recurring themes
through Hitchhiker's is,

it doesn't matter how
sophisticated and complicated it is,

most of the time
stuff just doesn't work.

[Robbie] The knife still works.
Nice little Star Wars reference there,

with the little noise that's made
when she switches on the knife.

[Sean] It's lovely. Also,
all the teapots and teacup themes...

[Robbie] Yes,
it's a properly stocked kitchen.

You've got cup-handlers and cup-holders
and so on in the back there.

– How badly does it hurt?
– It doesn't feel great.

[Sean] Not completely
properly stocked, there's no tea.

[Robbie] No, that's true,
there's no real tea.

Mice.

– [mice squeak]
– Hey!

Tricia... Trillian, sorry.
There's something I have to tell you.

– Please, don't.
– [Zaphod] Showtime, Trill.

Still enjoying the effects of the
Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster, I suspect.

[Sean] This cube, it's funny, Douglas
would pop into our office and go,

"What do you think about this?"

Um, One of the things
he wanted to know was,

if you had a cube you could carry
in your pocket, like a USB keyring,

that could store terabytes, basically
unlimited amounts of information,

what would you do with it?

And then he started talking about this
cube that can store video data and...

Those cubes,
we see another one later on,

are basically the galaxy's equivalent
of the USB keyring

you carry around in your pocket.

[Guide] They commissioned two
of their brightest and best...

It's particularly odd for me

seeing stuff that wasn't in the
original books, radio series, whatever,

that Douglas came in
and got very excited about.

But we had no idea at all that, that's
where it's going, little germs of ideas.

[Robbie] That he was actually
lacing through the movie

as it was making it's next transition.

I don't know what you think about it,
but we've got to talk about 42.

It seems to me
that the whole 42 sketch, in a way,

was like a big Monty Python sketch.

You can hear Terry Jones saying,
"42," repeating the answer.

Douglas was plagued all his life,
wasn't he, by 42.

It was a joke,

but it's remarkable how laced through
popular culture it's become.

Fox Mulder's apartment
in The X-Files is 42.

The robot that came to the door
in I, Robot was Robot 42.

You had some fun coincidences as well,

when we opened the doors to H2G2,
with taxis and pizza and beer bills.

[Sean] All stupid, spooky coincidences.

The IP address at The Digital Village,

these are allocated
completely at random,

but it's stuck in my head,

it's 195.173.97 dot whatever,

If you add up all those digits,
they make 42.

Whether our ISP thought, "Ha, ha, it's
Douglas's company, let's assign them..."

Things like, we'd stay overnight working
on something, miss the last train,

the taxi back to Hertfordshire,

42 pounds.

It's just... It's silly and it's spooky,

but at 3 a.m. and you've been up all
night working on something, it's...

[Robbie] Another good one,
a slightly bureaucratic one,

which I think Douglas would have liked.

The tax code that is being used,
helping to make the movie in the UK,

is Section 42 of the UK tax law.

So there's another 42 coincidence,
and we can go on and on and on.

The cycle route opposite my little
cottage in Wales is Cycle Route 42.

[Sean] But the great thing about it,

and what Robbie was saying
about Terry Jones,

when Douglas and Terry went
on the Starship Titanic novel tour,

at the Brighton Book Festival,

there was a big, big presentation there,
a huge theater,

people asking about Starship Titanic,

and was Douglas
gonna write another book,

really interesting conversations,
hundreds of people there,

and somebody puts their hand up
and goes, "Why did you choose 42?"

Two things. First this kind of combined
groan and titter through the audience,

and then Douglas doing what became
his signature reaction to this,

which was just blinking at the audience
and putting his face in his hands.

And Terry said,
"Shall I take this one, Douglas?"

[both laughing]

– [Robbie] Poor man.
– [Sean] It was fantastic.

Terry Jones going,
"It's just a funny number!"

[Robbie] That's all it is.

Wasn't there something
a few years back about a coefficient

at which the universe was expanding?

[Sean] Well, yes...

When you go off on tangents
into scary physics like that,

generally any number works.

[Robbie] Oh, right.

– Betraying my lack of physics...
– [Sean] Sorry.

[boom]

[Guide] The Infinite Improbability Drive
is a wonderful new method

of crossing interstellar distances
in a few seconds,

without all that tedious
mucking about in hyperspace.

Here we've got "all this tedious
mucking about in hyperspace."

Let's talk a bit more about parallel
universes and string theory and so on.

This remarkable thing
Douglas invented as a plot device

which has all this resonance
for current thinking.

What do you make of all that?

[Sean] Well, I think it's lovely.

One of the key things
about this is that,

it's Douglas's impact on the world
of science and technology.

I don't think even he got

how much scientists and techies

were really into his work.

Um, you'll find references everywhere.

So much so that, if you've got Douglas's
enthusiasm for this sort of thing,

and the imagination and the ideas,

they tend to shape so much,
you see subtle references everywhere.

Obviously, at the moment, I can't
think of any off the top of my head.

But I can pretty much say

that you won't find
a research department anywhere

that doesn't have a computer
named Deep Thought, or...

[Robbie stammers]
Yeah, it's very pervasive.

Yeah. We're here.

Now, they're about to arrive
at the planet Viltvodle.

For me, this whole sequence, which
we've built up quite substantially,

around a planet where people believe
we were sneezed into existence

by the Great Green Arkleseizure.

This is a very important theme
we've kept in the movie,

Douglas's views on organized religion.

For me, this is organized religion
getting both barrels.

We've created a whole religious
iconography around a species

that believed that we were
sneezed into existence.

This Guide entry is another example
of Douglas's atheism.

You must have had conversations with him
about that on numerous occasions.

[Sean] Exactly.
One of the nice things about it...

...when everybody happily sits down
and agrees it is a load of old nonsense,

then you don't really
have to discuss it that much.

You can sidetrack onto evolution,
which is much more fun.

[Robbie] Which is what Douglas
really enjoyed.

Here we go, there's some evolutionary
stuff here about the Jatravartids,

their multi-arms and inventing the
underarm deodorant before the wheel.

There's the square bicycle there.

[Sean] There's two really nice things,

first of all the environmental message
about aerosol cans.

Obviously, environmentalism
was very important for Douglas.

There's a character
we'll see slightly later,

sadly it's cut down to one scene.

But with all this pollution
and litter and aerosol cans everywhere,

it turns out that the oldest profession
on Viltvodle is litter collection.

[both laughing]

[Robbie] That's...

That was us riffing,
rather than Douglas, wasn't it?

That's a new idea in the script.

So this sculpt here is a 35-foot-high
sculpt of Douglas Adams' nose,

and all the noses you see
in this temple,

the whole religious symbolism,
is a 35-foot sculpt of Douglas' nose,

which we had done
when we built Starship Titanic.

[Sean] Absolutely.

[Robbie] We were able
to recover it and use it.

So this hymn and the singing,

sounding for all the world
like an 18th Century John Wesley hymn...

I feel this is one of the scenes that
Douglas would have really approved of.

It's definitely one of the scenes
which we've expanded substantially

since the last draft Douglas wrote.

When I was talking to John Malkovich
about it,

he was surprised to see...

...a scene like this.
It's the reason he took the movie,

because I think he shares
some of Douglas's views.

He was pretty surprised
to see it had managed to get by.

We lift our noses, clogged and unblown,

in reverence to you.

I love this little awkwardness.
What do we do?

The way Arthur responds.
He feels he ought to do it

but in a nice English way,
he doesn't quite go the whole hog.

And John makes these gestures
and a little sneezing

and he's just about to do a little sign.

Bless you. [laughing]

Which of course is a great pun.

And now inside.

This was all filmed at
the Freemasons' Hall, in central London.

It was the first time they'd ever
allowed a major movie film crew.

This is filmed
in one of the inner temples.

An awful lot of the carving in
the walls and so on we've not altered,

that's the way it looks inside.

It was a good week
when we had John Malkovich on set.

This whole idea
of the way that Malkovich moves

was something Garth had decided on
at a very early stage.

He gets more and more menacing.

To start with he looks like
Art Garfunkel, with his hair,

and then we see
his sunken eyes revealed.

[Sean] I love the way he just reaches
across, here we go, grabbing the glass.

Just feeling for it.

I should say about the hymn as well.

There was a call on the Internet
for people who could sing

to come down to a church
and it was absolutely packed full.

[Robbie] It was, wasn't it? It was
a lovely day, it was up in Highgate,

everybody singing away,
numerous versions.

I'm sure, elsewhere on the DVD,
we've probably got the whole hymn.

Now, there are various objects
around here, in the room,

because Humma is a bit of a collector.

Um, I think there's something that's
a model of a total perspective vortex.

– One of them is named that.
– [Sean] Oh, in the background.

There's definitely a Slinky,

which is brilliant,
one of the treasures of the universe.

So this is Grolda, the litter collector.

I mention this because she plays a very
big part in the mobile tie-in game.

You actually need to
solve a puzzle involving her.

Wait. We don't know why we're here.

We were trying to get to Magrathea
and our ship brought us here.

How very, very improbable.

This is one of
the absolutely key points,

it's the Improbability Drive
that's driving the story along.

They're trying to get to Magrathea,

they set the Heart of Gold to take them
to Magrathea and it brings them here.

Why? Well, because this is the way
to get to Magrathea.

It seems incredibly unlikely,
a ridiculous coincidence,

but the one person who has the
coordinates for Magrathea is Humma.

[Robbie] We'll find that gently,
behind the scenes,

the mice are pulling
the odd string as well.

They're the hyper-intelligent

pan-dimensional beings.

A lot of the squeaking and scurrying
around you see back on the ship.

It's an example of the way
we needed to try and find

the odd plot consistency in what
is otherwise a series of random events,

and just try and drive that story
through just a little bit more.

Sometimes I feel it doesn't
bear too close a scrutiny.

[laughing] It's still the pretty wild
and improbable world of Hitchhiker's.

– That's the great thing about it.
– Which is the great thing about it.

In that sense, it doesn't have to be
phenomenally tightly plotted.

[Zaphod chuckles hysterically] Oh, no!

– [Zaphod] Hey, take it easy now.
– [electric saw]

No, stop it. That kind of tickles.

Suddenly, the movie transforms

into something out of
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,

all those German Expressionist movies.

Come back. Don't leave me alone.

You notice the mice, there.
Two little mice.

There were two mice in the object
on the far right, two little sugar mice.

[Sean] Ah.

[Robbie] Again, notice the detail
on the temple nose base there.

You've got knights holding statues
but also,

every second knight is blowing its nose.

[whoosh]

This was astonishing. We were
filming this on a set up in Frogmore,

in a huge great big
aircraft-hangar-like thing,

and coordinating these Vogons
really took some doing.

[Sean] You see a bit
of Douglas's nose there.

The president is the kidnapper.
You'll kill him.

Bang! Bang!

[Arthur] It's locked!

[Sean] See the aerosol can
stuck on the stiletto heel, there.

– Zaphod doing this amazing...
– [Robbie] Ludicrous dancing.

This is a bit of a joke about
fire from guns never actually working.

We do have a line later,
with Marvin saying

that Vogons are the worst shots in the
universe, just before he gets popped.

At the very end.

They're shooting at us.
What are we going to do?

– [Trillian] I have an idea.
– Pushing him out and running away?

[Arthur] What? He's the one they want.

[Sean] This is another puzzle in the...

Douglas's nose, there.

I have the president
and I will kill him, I swear.

– Could that actually kill him?
– I don't think so.

It's an aerosol can.

The sequence of Zaphod
on the temple steps,

you see the full sequence

in the Zaphod Beeblebrox
For President video.

[Robbie] Yes, absolutely,
the wonderful song we wrote

as part of the launch
for the whole movie,

when we were launching the movie
back in April 2005.

Close Encounters
kind of light effects there.

I know Spielberg, in those early movies,
was a big influence on Garth

in terms of the way this all looks.

The Heart of Gold escapes and
we're off to Vogsphere for questioning.

[Kwaltz] Bring her to Vogsphere
for processing, captain.

And we've got the doors sighing.

Talk about the doors sighing.

Those noises are obviously
all made by people,

but the sighing ship
and the personality of the ship.

[Sean] Oh, yeah... Pretty much all
the equipment on the Heart of Gold

appears to have genuine
people personality.

Well, actually, no. All the doors
on the ship have a sunny disposition.

In the radio series, because
you can't see doors opening and closing,

they would actually
thank you for using them

and generally be very happy that they
were able to open and close for you.

I've been talking
to the ship's computer.

And?

It hates me.

No. Eddie, computer,

is there another way
to follow the ships?

[computer] Activating Emergency Escape
Pod. It's super-neat and fun to fly.

[Arthur] Owl

Eddie the Shipboard Computer.

[Arthur] I'm In. OK,
Ford, do you have any idea?

– [Ford] We'll press this button.
– No.

[Robbie] Buttons. Pressing buttons.

This is an integral part
of Hitchhikers' folklore as well.

[Sean] The original
"please do not press this button again"

right back in the radio series.

Ford... Sorry, Arthur rather.

Arthur randomly pressing
a button on a spaceship.

And the light coming up saying,
"Please do not press this button again."

– I don't need that.
– OK.

[Arthur] Stop the rocking.
Marvin, any ideas?

[Marvin] I have a million ideas.
They all point to certain death.

[Arthur] Thanks, Marv.

[Sean] Um... A British
three-pin power plug, there.

[Robbie] That's right, ships landing to
recharge. That's what they're based on.

Crabs again, the jeweled crabs we were
talking about earlier, on Vogsphere.

This is... Making ships crash on planets
is notoriously expensive.

So this is quite a neat little way
of crashing a spaceship,

by watching it
from the crab's perspective.

This is all filmed at a quarry in Wales,

which is keeping up a noble tradition
of British science fiction and quarries.

A lot of Doctor Who, where Douglas
started his life as a screenwriter,

was filmed in quarries.

Garth had originally said,
"No quarries."

The location finders brought pictures

and he said,
"That looks fantastic, where is it?"

And it was then disclosed
that it was a quarry.

Near Tredegar in South Wales.

It was very, very cold
while we were filming there.

It was July and it was chilly.

You can see the gray skies,
but they rather suited Vogsphere.

– What is it?
– It's a thinking cap.

[Ford] There you go.

[Robbie] Start talking about
the sequence coming up.

This is a very particular story
for you and some of the colleagues.

[Sean] Yeah, exactly.

It was four of us
at The Digital Village,

when Douglas had moved
over to Santa Barbara

and would pop over from time to time.

Douglas came dashing into our office
on a lovely sunny afternoon,

with a laptop,

with his PowerBook.

"Read this,
I've been working on it on the plane."

He prints it out,

and hands round, basically this scene.

What did we think?

It was absolutely hilarious then,
and now, seeing it on the screen,

it's probably the high point
of my career,

sitting in an office
in The Digital Village,

and having Douglas Adams going,
"What do you think?"

It's original Douglas material, just
written on the plane on the way over.

The brilliant thing about it is
that it's working on so many levels.

The whole point
of these slapsticks coming up

whenever you have an original thought
or idea or imagination,

are that they're there to drive
the development of the Vogons.

Someone is specifically
tampering with their evolution,

to produce a race of beings

who have no imagination,
no ideas, no creativity,

they just get things done.

And this idea of an external force
coming in and influencing evolution,

is the thing
right at the beginning of 2001,

which was Douglas's
favorite movie of all time.

The monolith appearing
and just tweaking

the evolutionary
development of humans.

This is exactly the same thing,
you've got that reference there.

Also, the really clever thing about it,

is the fact that here we've got
things designed to stop creative thought

and actually, a really key plot point,

when Ford describes very early on
that the Vogons have no imagination

there's the setup.
It's paying off here,

but we've got this complicated,
"Why the Vogons are like they are?

Who is actually the driving force?

Who is making the Vogons evolve
into this bureaucratic race?"

Um... a complicated, clever idea,

and then Douglas does it as slapstick.

Just fantastic.

[Robbie] Absolutely. Truly, we have
great slapstick comedy in there.

And, of course, the reason that
the Vogon noses look the way they look,

those snub noses they've got is
the result of all that paddle-slapping.

[Arthur] Ooh! Ah!

[tram bell rings]

[Vogon] You're supposed to stop.

[siren blaring]

This whole sequence is designed to be...

It's a big rescue moment...

Trillian has been taken
to Vogsphere for questioning.

Arthur's being brave
and he's thought he's got an idea.

So he's taken Marvin's arm.

But it's all so underwhelming,

it's done in such a British,
underwhelming way.

And this was us trying to keep
the whole spirit of Hitchhiker's,

thinking, the Star Wars way of doing it
would be to fight you're way in.

But we'll make it
this bureaucratic rescue,

as they try and navigate their way
around the ludicrousies of bureaucracy.

A little bit about
Douglas and bureaucracy,

because it was a life-long source of
horrible fascination for him, wasn't it?

[Sean] Yes, there was
that whole thing about when he...

He moved house and had to let his
bank know about his change of address.

They kept sending the change of address
forms to his old address. It was just...

There's some fantastic bits of writing
from Douglas, letters to the bank.

It drove him round the twist so much
that it inspired him to write

his second computer game,
text adventure, for Infocom,

Bureaucracy, completely
driven by events from real life.

Banks. Thirty years later
and they still haven't changed.

[Robbie] It's one of those themes

which mean Hitchhiker's
has got universal appeal.

We all have met Vogons in our lives,

and the ludicrousness of trying
to navigate your way around people

who just seem unable
to have an original thought.

...to destroy a planet?

– He said the gray building, right?
– All the buildings are gray.

"Give me a hand." Ha-ha, very funny.

How am I supposed to drive this pod
with one arm? Stupid human.

[Vogon clerk] So you need
to go back and fill that in.

Then, make sure, when you fill in
the facilitating form...

Leave this to me. I'm British.
I know how to queue.

[Vogon clerk]
If you'd fill that form in for me,

and return it as soon as possible.

– Writing implements to your left...
– You're president. Can you do anything?

Presidents don't have power. Their job
is to draw attention away from it.

Hey, how you doin'?

Hey, it's me, your president.
What's goin' on? Thanks for coming.

All right. I know that sponge.
All right.

– Next.
– President coming through.

How you doin', Pinhead?
No, really, it's me.

I love kabuki. Look at that.

– [Arthur] Out the way.
– [alien roars]

– Give us a kiss!
– [alien squeals]

Hi, I've come about
release of a prisoner.

Prisoner release form.

Oh, wha...?

I don't believe you.

These are the orders.

"Love and kisses"?

Mm. Now, according
to the Galactic Penal Code,

the punishment for
a presidential kidnapping

is to be fed to
the Ravenous Bug blatter Beast of Traal.

Good day.

[Robbie] The Ravenous
Bugblatter Beast of Traal.

[Sean] A creature
so incredibly stupid that it thinks

if you can't see it, it can't see you.

Um... Trillian doesn't have her towel

so she can't wrap it round her head
and defend herself.

[Robbie] The box you see in the back,
that was a real box.

It weighs about a ton,

it's being jumped around
with compressed air.

I love this detail,
the Guide just being used,

no big reference,
it's just being used as a prop.

There's just his eye.

That box was real on set and that's
Zooey doing her own stunt as well.

She did her own stunts for this movie.

And this is sort of... A lot of goo
and gunk starts to come out of the box

as the beast rather disgustingly
starts to salivate.

They're still trying to find their way
round the Vogon bureaucracy.

One of the things that
characterizes this whole movie,

is that those Vogons
were being puppeteered.

The actors were really
able to respond to the puppeteer

and to the person doing the voice.

It just gave the whole thing
such a playful heart to it, really.

[Sean] I love that little scene,

where they point
to Zaphod's portrait on the wall.

It's sadly gone now
but it used to be that,

in pretty much every bit
of every British government office,

there would be that portrait
of the Queen on the wall.

And it's lovely
that they're echoing it there.

Just... Forms.

We're just hanging out.

OK, this is for Tricia McMillan.

Tricia McMillan. OK.

[Sean] The endless punches
and things she's got there.

[Robbie] A huge number of Vogon props
were made for the movie.

Water-coolers and hole-punches
and coffee cups and mugs.

Zaphod's here.
Well, then, that's fine then.

Let's just go and get him.

[Robbie] That's the goo
I was talking about.

Who are we waiting for again?

[Robbie] One thing people were concerned
about, with one of the draft scripts,

was the relationship
between Ford and Arthur.

In a way, it's the most enduring
relationship through all the books,

there's genuine affection
between the two of them.

There was a draft where Ford
was always trying to ditch Arthur

but every time,
Arthur saved his life again.

It was something that got out on the Net
and the fans didn't like it very much.

It was something Douglas
had been playing around with,

but we went back to Ford and Arthur
genuinely being buddies.

...destroyed because you thought
they wanted your autograph.

– [Zaphod] They framed me!
– Are you an idiot?

– Trillian.
– You knew. Why didn't you tell me?

– He threatened me.
– Get a backbone, Arthur.

A backbone? What about coming here
to rescue you? Thank you. My idea. Oh!

Stupid!

– Got your arm.
– [Marvin] How considerate.

Right, then, all those lucky enough
to have two arms, hold tight.

Oh, the president tests my patience.

This time I shall pursue him myself.
Ready my ship.

Fantastic. At last.

[whistle sounds]

Oh. That's one hour for lunch,
everybody.

I think I'll have soup today.

[Robbie] Here we go, another plot point.

It's not anti-Star Wars,
it's more the flip-side of Star Wars,

rather than a big rescue
or a big pursuit,

it's the lunch hour...

[chuckling] ...that prevents everybody
from doing what they need to do.

The famous shower scene
from Hitchhiker's now.

[Sean] Another reason
to have your towel.

– Oh, I'm so sorry.
– No, come in.

I... I didn't... Um...

[Sean] You'll notice
quite a few references to this,

people who saw a rough cut of it,
the Hitchhiker's Guide

has this to say about love:
"Mostly painful."

That's been picked up
and quoted all over the net now.

[Robbie] Even though
we changed the lines in the end.

– They're out there for all time, then.
– [Sean] Exactly.

[Robbie] Between you and me,
I preferred "mostly painful."

Not quite sure why we changed it.

...if I'd said yes to you
and gone to Madagascar,

then neither of us would be here now.

[Sean] Of course, Madagascar being
an absolutely fantastic place,

from an evolutionary perspective.

One of Douglas's huge things,
the fact you've got lemurs there.

Because Madagascar separated
from the original coast of Africa,

it took a different evolutionary path,

so you've got a snapshot there.
So lovely reference.

[Robbie] Lovely reference,
and not unintentional.

There are lots of places we could have
chosen and Madagascar was very specific.

[Sean] Douglas's favorite book,
Last Chance to See, it's all in there.

[Robbie] That was the book that, when
asked, he said he was most proud of,

that wonderful book he wrote with Mark
Carwardine about endangered species.

Written with his customary
wit and brilliance.

[computer] Engaging Improbability Drive.

[Ford] No, Zaphod, no.
Buttons are not toys. What did you do?

[Sean] I love that "buttons
are not toys" thing.

[Robbie] That was improvised
by the actors.

Zooey, I think, came up with that
on the set herself.

[computer]
It blows my circuits to tell you

that we're in orbit,
at an altitude of 300 miles...

[Robbie] So they're finally here.

People will notice,
most of the new material in the movie

has just been in the mid-section,
with Humma Kavula and paddles,

all making it that much more difficult
to get to Magrathea.

In classic film-writing terms,

the books have a very long first act
to get everybody on the Heart of Gold,

no second act,
and then they get to Magrathea.

Douglas was working very hard
to create all that new material

to make it more difficult
to get to Magrathea,

where they've finally arrived.

Now, coming up, very important.
Everybody will recognize this man.

This is the original Arthur Dent,
Simon Jones.

He came in towards
the end of filming, at Shepperton.

We filmed him on blue screen
and of course he's filmed in three-D.

If you've got
your red and green three-D glasses,

he will appear in three-D for you,
as a lovely little nod.

He talked to me at a party
at Jane Belsen's, Douglas's wife,

and said, "You've got to get me a part."
I always wanted to get him a part,

it was a question
of the right part for him.

He sat on a revolving chair
and did these lines, and he was great.

I'm very glad he was in the movie.

[Sean] So this is the second
Douglas Adams project

that features stereo glasses.

[Robbie] Yes, because we did it
for Starship Titanic as well.

[Sean] Unfortunately... Sorry!
They used red-blue.

So you need to...

The Starship Titanic glasses
won't work for this one.

[shouts and cries]

[computer] Something's jamming
my guidance system.

Starbix again.

[Robbie] He's pretty connected
to his Starbix.

Computer, do something.

[computer] Sure. Handing over
manual control. Good luck.

[brakes screech]

[engines roar]

[Zaphod] I need some help.
I can't do this without my third arm.

[Robbie] Which has been taken
by Humma Kavula, along with his head.

A plot point which, no doubt, we will
have to resolve in the case of sequels.

[Sean] Something that just struck me,

the Magrathean hologram
says "for training purposes"

It's great. There's lots of
Douglas being driven round the twist

by phone companies in the books.

So it's great to have....

[Robbie] A classic
phone message in there.

– What will happen?
– I don't know.

Don't do it. We're here.
No telling where it'll send us.

– No, sod it all.
– No.

[Robbie] In the background, you
can see a booth called an ocular,

which was used heavily
in the marketing of the movie.

Little pods you could sit in
and watch the movie.

So that's actually real. That's the only
real world object, in the background.

Apparently, they've turned
into a bowl of petunias.

[Sean] I love the smacking
off the windshield. Just superb.

[Robbie] Now, that's a whale that
Henson's Creature Shop actually built.

For me, this forthcoming scene was
a real litmus test for the whole movie.

It sums up everything that makes
Douglas Adams a genius, really.

You've got the wild invention
of turning two missiles

into a sperm whale
and a bowl of petunias.

You've got a discussion the whale has
with himself as he falls to the ground,

an ontological discussion:

How can I be
without language to name myself?

A meditation on the relationship
between language and existence.

And then he falls to Earth
with a great big thud.

Everything's there, the invention,
the ideas and the humor.

It just was a key scene.

Money changed hands amongst
the production team

that this scene
wouldn't make it into the final cut.

Because it comes at a time,
classically,

when you should be driving
towards the end of the movie.

Your characters arrive where they've
been trying to get to most of the movie.

But we go off on this
completely Hitchhiker-y moment.

It's got no character relevance, no
plot relevance, it's purely discursive,

and I know a lot of people thought
it would never make the final cut.

It would always be
the kind of thing that,

when you were looking
to make up time, you'd lose.

What's been interesting is that,
when we did the first test screenings,

this scene, almost invariably,

featured in people's top three scenes.

I think it's wonderful
and I'm so glad that it stayed.

I wonder if it will be
friends with me. Hello, ground.

Boom. We haven't got the guts,
we have kept it at a distance.

[Guide]... went through
the mind of the bowl of petunias

as it fell was, "Oh, no, not again."

[Sean] And again, a classic bit of...

Oh, just listen here.

[distant shattering]

The bowl of petunias breaking.

If you've got a home cinema,
surround sound,

it's brilliant,
it's off behind you, in the distance.

[wind blows]

Laughing with colleagues
from TDV about this,

and they hadn't twigged that
that's what it was.

– So everybody listening out...
– [Robbie] Listening for the crash.

[Sean] The brilliant thing
about the bowl of petunias saying,

"Oh, no, not again,"

is yet another fantastic example of the
way Douglas does a silly throwaway joke

and then, two books later, turns it into
an absolutely major plot device.

The bowl of petunias is a character,

in Life, the Universe and Everything.

No spoilers here.

But we meet the bowl of petunias again,

and they play a major role
in the third book.

It's Douglas setting stuff up,
maybe just as a throwaway joke,

thinking about it, changing it,
and suddenly we've a major plot device.

[Robbie] Yeah,
his capacity to do that...

When the radio series was written,

it was like Dickens
starting his early novels,

published in those serials, and he
didn't know where they were going.

It wasn't until Dombey And Son
when a frontispiece was published

and he knew where the plot was going.

But this phenomenal capacity
to improvise and to hold the threads

and this increasing complexity
through all these stories.

I mean, he was truly
in that very, very thin layer

of primary creative people.

And those jokes around bowls of petunias
and sperm whales and so on

just sort of
sum the whole thing up, really.

She's gone. Ford, she's gone.

Arthur, don't panic.

– Ford.
– [Zaphod] Hey, wait for me.

We were laughing on set
at the time here,

because if anybody knows
their Classic Film-Writing 101,

one of the things your hero classically
has to do, on his hero's journey,

is approach his innermost cave.

It's a classic piece
of mythological writing stuff,

and here is Arthur
approaching his innermost cave.

We were laughing about it on the set,

as he tries to steel himself
to follow everybody through the...

There he goes, and of course,
in the classic Arthur way, boom,

it's too late.

[chuckling] And so he has failed
to enter his innermost cave.

One of the only pieces of classic
mythological thinking about movies

that's crept its way
into the script there.

Of course, this was
a very, very, very hot set.

It had more lights and was hotter
than any other set we worked on,

even the Heart of Gold,
which set a high standard.

[Sean] That line there, when Arthur
goes, "Did you?" Just superb.

[Robbie] This trick is one of the oldest
filmmaking tricks in the book.

Throw the dummy in
and you do a frame cut.

So, you throw the dummy in, cut, then
the actor's lying there and gets up.

It's as old as filmmaking itself,
you'd have seen that in silent movies.

I love the richness
of the mix we've got.

We always felt that if you'd given
Hitchhiker's the full-on CG treatment,

it would've rattled around inside it.
What's lovely is,

it's got all these filmmaking tricks,
all these jokes in it.

...alone on a dead planet,
with a manically depressed robot.

[Marvin] You think you've got problems.

What if you are
a manically depressed robot?

[man] Excuse me.

– [Arthur screaming]
– [man] Whoa, whoa.

[Sean] Now this is,
again, Douglas having,

right back in the radio series,
an enormous laugh here.

He named this character Slartibartfast,
So there's two things.

One, collecting together
as many rude words as he can

and knitting them together
into somebody's name,

but also, for the poor typist
who had to type this all up,

typing Slartibartfast
over and over again,

with the payoff of
"My name is not important,"

just for a little private joke for
whoever's having to type up the script,

they've typed pages and pages of this
huge great, very silly-sounding name,

and there's no point to it at all,
"My name is not important."

[Robbie] Yeah,
that's Douglas playing around.

[Sean] When he's supposed
to be writing the script.

Coming up with things and going,
"This'll be fun." Go off at a tangent.

I said it wasn't important.

Well... So my friends are safe?

Let me show you.

[Marvin] I could calculate your chances
of survival, but you won't like it.

[clank]

[Robbie] This whole design...
This is the planet factory showroom,

and it's based on the reptile house
at London Zoo.

And deliberately very retro,

so we can have
some of people's favorite lines

about making fjords and...

Then the galactic economy collapsed,
and seeing that custom-built planets

are a bit of a luxury commodity...

Come with me because there's been
a terrible mix-up with your planet.

Best laid plans of mice, you know.

– And men.
– What?

Best laid plans of mice and men.

[laughs] Yes, well, I don't think men
have much to do with it.

Now this whole sequence
builds up to the big CG moment.

But keep an ear out
for the sound effects here.

There's this slightly low-tech feel

that we've still got
to this whole place at the moment.

Keep an ear out for the sound the other
cart makes as it comes through the door.

[clicking, ratcheting]

Just like the ghost train, like getting
on a ghost train at a fairground.

This was an early scene
that Garth described to me,

he clearly had this visualized
from a very early stage,

that we'd go down this tunnel

which would give you
this immense feeling of speed

and things building
to a phenomenal climax.

It scares the willies out of me.

Aghh! Aghh!

[Robbie] I'm not gonna spoil the moment,

but we're about to go
over the planet factory floor,

and there's a head planet and
I'm sure people will recognize the head.

[Slartibartfast] Ha, ha, ha.
Welcome to our factory floor.

That is Douglas's head, from the same
three-D sculpt we got his nose from.

But there's his whole head
in the background.

This took absolutely months
to conceive, that scene,

building that sense of space.

How did Douglas describe
the planet factory floor?

"Conveying the sense of infinite space
better than infinity itself."

That's a good brief for a CG company.
How do you set to work on that?

[Zaphod] Yeah, this is it.

This is it.

Having Deep Thought watch cartoons,
that was a new Douglas idea as well,

specially for the movie.

And those are cartoons
that Garth designed.

[Sean] I think they're lovely.
Just odd, surreal little things.

The second most powerful
computer in the universe

and it just decides
to sit around and watch cartoons.

Very similar, actually, probably
Douglas referencing Dirk Gently.

[Robbie] How so?

[Sean] There is a character
in Dirk Gently

who is sitting watching cartoons

while Dirk Gently himself
is trying to interrogate this character.

I'm not going to spoil anything else.

[Robbie] I'm sure
that was Douglas again.

It's this riffing thing, endlessly
playing around with these ideas,

loving the idea that he'd created these
characters and creatures and places,

which he was able to
reinvent and recreate.

[hiccup]

Well, I don't wanna bother you,
so I'm gonna... Good stuff.

Great. I'm gonna go find something
else for my entire life to be about.

[Sean laughs] I love those...

It's bizarre, they're like
Roobarb and Custard, or...

[Robbie] They are like Roobarb and
Custard, a kids' TV program from the UK,

back in the '70s or '80s,
famous little ten-minute short.

[crashing, rumbling]

[cart squeals]

There you are.

Look familiar?

– [Arthur] So it wasn't destroyed?
– Actually, it was...

[Sean] Again, Douglas completely
getting the whole computer stuff.

The idea that if you are going to have

an immensely huge software project
like this, you take backups.

Any writer now knows the
"Oh, no, I've lost all my work

because the damned Mac decided
to hang and give me a frowny face."

And it's in So Long,
and Thanks for All the Fish,

Douglas's fourth Hitchhiker's novel.

I'm not going to say
it's not made clear.

There is endless debate about

whether that Earth was one of the
multiple Earths that happened to exist,

whether it was recreated
and paid for by the dolphins.

It's never fully explained.

But the Earth keeps coming back.

It's constantly destroyed,
but it keeps coming back.

But if you were building the most
powerful computer in the universe,

wouldn't you take regular backups?

[Robbie] I just spotted one of the
relatively rare continuity problems,

I'm sure they're already
on the Internet,

a Point-of-View Gun covered in dust and
then a shiny new one being handed over.

– [Sean] Self cleaning, nanotechnology.
– [Robbie] That must be it.

That must be the reason.

The Point-of-View Gun, a brand new
plot device that Douglas Adams created.

If you shoot somebody with it,
they understand your point of view.

[Guide] ...pull the trigger,

they instantly see things
from your point of view.

[Robbie] A new Guide entry
had to be written for the movie.

...commissioned by a consortium
of intergalactic angry housewives

who, after arguments
with their husbands,

were sick of ending
those arguments with the phrase,

"You just don't get it, do you?"

[blast]

Uh, uh, and you're right,
I shouldn't be so upset

because life goes on, you know,
and I should just go on with it.

Shoot him again.

– [Zaphod] Whoa.
– [blast]

Hitchhiking's good.
Towels are good too.

– [Zaphod] Say what?
– That is brilliant.

[Zaphod] What's goin'...?

I can see why Humma Kavula
would want one of these.

– We better get back. Arthur's waiting.
– Who cares?

I do. Especially since we're somewhat
of an endangered species, thanks to you.

[Zaphod] Why so edgy, baby doll? Relax.

[Robbie] This scene strikes me as
a very Hitchhiker-y way of managing

an emotional denouement.
Douglas was very wary of sentiment.

But these characters
have to have these moments,

as their own stories develop.

I love that the lines
have been given to Zaphod.

He's speaking what she's feeling.

Zooey just has to... Well, "just"...
It's a very touching piece of acting.

She, um...

...realizes what it is that Arthur
maybe does mean to her after all.

...another in a long line of men
who doesn't really get you.

Huh? That's not true.

You're worried you might have blown
it with the one guy who really does.

Hey, whoops.

Oh, baby doll.

Give me that thing.

[sighs] It won't affect me.
I'm already a woman.

Douglas wrote that line.

And it's interesting, so far I've seen
that line plays OK in the UK,

but really well in the US.

Maybe there's just different
sexual politics in the two countries.

[Slartibartfast] Voilà.
Himalayas. Good, eh?

[Robbie] That's such a ludicrous line.

"Voilà, Himalayas," indeed.

Earthman, you must realize

that the planet you lived on
was commissioned,

paid for and run by mice.

[Sean] As a long-time fan from way back,

it's lovely seeing this that happens
so quickly in the radio series.

It's a brilliant gag,
it plays out really nicely.

And here, it's suddenly the reveal
at the end of the movie.

Hitchhiker's has become
almost a mystery.

The setup, Deep Thought
with information deleted at the end,

and then Arthur's
finally discovering all this stuff.

[Robbie] It's what's given
this movie its story arc.

[Sean] Thank you.

[Arthur] Actually, this explains a lot.

All my life,
I've had this strange feeling

there's something big and sinister
going on in the world.

No, that's normal paranoia.

[Robbie] The paranoia line.

I was asked about social satire
and Hitchhiker's

and I love that that kind of line
has stayed in the movie.

...so absurdly remote

that the only thing to do is say hang
the sense of it and keep yourself busy.

I'd much rather be happy
than right any day.

– And are you?
– Uh... No.

[laughs] That's where it all falls down.

[Robbie] The white cliffs of Dover.

For our non-English dwellers.

Or non-England dwellers, I should say.

Here you are then.

And now we come back to
a perfectly restored Arthur's house.

All the Magrathean workers
laying the turf in the background,

great big rolls of turf.

[Sean] A white picket fence.

[Robbie] Yes, much nicer
than it was when he left it.

One of the things in Bill's performance
here which maybe people would miss,

he's being a bit sad because he knows
what the mice want to do to Arthur,

they want his brain.

So he knows he's brought him back

to an unpleasant experience.

He's grown fond of him in short time
they've known each other.

There you are.

[Robbie] Ahh! One of my pet things.
I'm sure everybody hates it.

I loathe watching people
talk with their mouths full.

They made up for it by making us

this amazing meal.

[Robbie] It's the same song that was
playing at the beginning, in the pub.

Magic Moments.

– [Sean] Perry Como?
– [Robbie] Yeah.

We're glad you like it,
Earth creature.

[Robbie] I like the fact that the voices
here are Garth and his sister,

the voices of the mice.

And he finally gets his cup of tea.

– Please, drink.
– Um, uh, excuse me.

– Uh, is there anything else?
– No, we're quite happy, thank you.

Um, good, I'll be outside, so...

You were right.

Hence Bill's last little look. He's
concerned they're gonna take his brain.

To business.

[Sean] The brain, of course,
being the key part of the puzzle.

[Robbie] That's right,
finally to reboot the Earth

and make sure it can continue
to calculate the ultimate question.

Which is why you're here.
We've been offered a lucrative contract

to do several 5-D TV chat shows.

But here's the point.
We must have product.

We need the ultimate question,
or one that sounds ultimate.

– Of course.
– We've rebuilt the planet.

Now all we need
is the missing piece of the puzzle.

– Which happens to be your brain.
– Right.

[Mouse] More tea?

Sorry, did you just say
you need my brain?

Yes, to complete the program.

You can't have my brain. I'm using it.

– Hardly.
– Hardly? Cheeky... Cheeky mouse.

It's all real stuff
happening on the set here.

These things rising up
out of the fruit bowl and so on.

All real gadgets
made specially to work on set.

What was in my tea?

Don't worry. You won't feel a thing.

[grunts and whimpers]

Just wait a sodding minute.

You want a question
that goes with the answer 42?

What about, what's 6x7?

Or how many Vogons
does it take to change a light bulb?

Here's one: how many roads
must a man walk down?

What I like about what's coming up is,

it's a sort of Hitchhiker-y way
of dealing with,

we've got a big moment now
where Arthur says,

"I love Trillian,"
and, "Is she the one?"

"Yes," and, "It's not about 42,"
and so on.

What I love is, it's instantly deflated
by the way the mice respond

to this impassioned speech.

Is she the one?

The answer bloody well isn't 42,
it's yes.

Undoubtedly, unequivocally,
unabashedly, yes.

And for one week,

one week in my sad little blip
of an existence,

it made me happy.

That's a good answer.

Rubbish. We don't want to be happy.
We want to be famous.

[Robbie and Sean laughing]

[Robbie] Now, coming up, there's
a good swear word from the mice.

We were delighted we were allowed
to get away with this word.

Garth danced around the room saying
he was allowed to have his bollocks.

– [screams]
– It wasn't me. I'm famous.

[Sean] Spookily enough, the whole
Douglas and Doctor Who connection,

they managed to just get it in,
at the end of the new series of Dr Who

that was showing at the time
the movie opened at the cinema.

– [Robbie] Get what in?
– Bollocks.

– [Robbie] Really? They had it as well?
– Yeah.

In almost exactly the same way.
Aliens being killed, "Oh, bollocks."

[voices]

[vibrations]

Follow me.

[Vogons] Left, right, left, right.

[Robbie] One of the things to keep
an ear out for in the coming sequence

is the improvised lines the Vogons speak
as they're being chased around.

Particularly when Ford is chasing them
round at the back of the house.

... here for your protection.

Thanks, man. I appreciate it.

Fire.

No.

[Marvin] What's all the fuss about?

Vogons are the worst marksmen
in the galaxy. Ooh.

– For God's sake, stop.
– Cease fire.

Now I've got a headache...
headahce... headache...

[Robbie] Now look what you've done.

Marvin.

[Zaphod] Oh, no.

[Sean] It's interesting... Oh,
here we go. Ford with his towel again.

I'm gonna get us outta here.
How do you drive this thing?

– [Robbie] What were you gonna say?
– Yeah...

Spookily,
the whole Arthur romance thing,

in So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish,

when Fenchurch and Arthur discover

God's final message to his creation...

I have to say, the Vogons have to go the
other way because he's locked the gate.

– [Robbie] He's locked the gate.
– From the other side.

[Robbie] They couldn't
reach over and get it.

[Sean] One of the things in Douglas's
fourth Hitchhiker novel,

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish,

there's a very big... A love story
plays a very predominant part in it.

Not with Trillian, with Fenchurch,

but Fenchurch and Arthur go off
to go and see the galaxy.

They want to see
God's final message to his creation

which is on these huge deserty,
fiery plains.

They discover Marvin there

and it's a very similar
kind of tender moment.

Every time I've seen this in the cinema,
people have gone, "Awww," there.

It's the same moment in So Long...

[Robbie] Thanks for all the tenderness.

The thing is, there is tenderness
in the Hitchhiker's universe.

What's the point?

[Robbie] That previous scene,
the fish out of water thing,

Zaphod trying to make the caravan go,
as if it's a spaceship.

It's a nice touch, turning him into...

He's not quite in his element
at the moment either.

Sorry about your spaceship, Arthur.

A great way of using
the Point-of-View Gun,

to wrap everything up.

That was something we wanted to shoot.

The idea of the Point-of-View Gun,
what a great way of ending.

That always gets a very big laugh.

Every time I've watched people
suddenly realizing what's just happened,

it's Marvin shooting

with the Point-of-View Gun
and they've all collapsed

in a sort of slough of despond.

[Sean] Marvin doing exactly
the same as in the books,

basically saving the day by depressing
the hell out of the adversaries.

You could do all of that, but it's
not gonna... I'll ask... I'll just ask.

I've just been informed
by some of the lads

that since we're so near completion,

we're gonna go ahead and finish Earth.

Well, we can put it back exactly
as it was when you left, you know.

Unless there's, um...

there's, you know,
anything you want to change.

Something you think
your planet could do without.

Yeah. Me.

Oh! Um, hello?

No, as is. Yep, leave it.

[Robbie] I love that line,
the way Bill says, "As is."

"No, it's fine."
It's such a ludicrous line,

taking that idea of a planet
that's been built.

"No, it's fine,
we'll leave it as it is."

Unashamedly setting up the sequel, The
Restaurant At The End Of The Universe.

I need to go to Humma's.
He's got something of mine.

– I think. I'm so confused.
– Don't worry, baby. We'll sort it out.

All right, let's trip the light
fantastic, baby. Just you and me.

Come on.

– You got your towel?
– Yeah...

Final towel reference,
Ford's concern for Arthur coming up.

And a sweet underplayed, understated
final moment for Arthur and Trillian.

OK. Hold tight.

[speaker] Stand by for commencement
of life cycle. In three, two, one...

[Zaphod] All right! Whoo!

[Robbie] It was always very important
that this scene should feel elegiac,

the same sort of emotional punch What
A Wonderful World had in the TV series.

[Sean] For the nit-pickers,
presumably the Earth is being moved

from the factory floor at Magrathea

and dropped into normal space.

[Robbie] It's being delivered.
Absolutely, we get that bit.

Douglas's mum again,
and family, coming back to life.

Keep an eye out for
the very last frame of the movie.

[Marvin] ...cares what I say,

but the restaurant
is at the other end of the universe.

[brakes screech]

[Sean] Again,
a very silly, throwaway gag,

but if you think about
how clever Marvin really is,

then that line is even cleverer.

[Robbie] Why so?

[Sean] There's two things.
Well, quite a whole series of them.

Um, The Restaurant
At The End Of The Universe,

the actual joke is that it's at the end
of the universe, the end of all time.

So there's the possibility that...
We've talked this to death.

It could be, for example,

the classic Isaac Asimov
foundation series,

where there were the two foundations
at the opposite ends of the universe.

So there are two ends of the universe.

But also, even cleverer than that,

again referencing Douglas's idea
about the plural zones

and multiple possibilities
and so forth,

why does there have to be
just one end of the universe?

– Sorry, I'm rambling.
– [Robbie] No, that's a good thought.

Exactly, the parallel universe,
there'd be lots of ends of the universe.

We loved the idea
of having this lounge version.

Sort of a Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra,
easy listening version

of the So Long,
And Thanks For All The Fish song.

Sung wonderfully by Neil Hannon.

[Robbie] The titles roll
for a long time

and you realize how many people
work on one of these big movies.

But coming up in a little while,
there's a little extra,

which is a Guide entry

that we wrote to punctuate
the credits here.

It's the famous Guide entry
which ends up with

a battle fleet
being swallowed by a small dog.

Douglas, I think, was always
a little fed up that Men In Black

beat him to the finishing post really,
that Men In Black got made first.

I think I'm right
that they swiped that idea

of a dog eating something,

changing perspective, changing scale.

So we thought we'd do the real one,

show people where it had
actually come from in the first place.

[Sean] And, again, it's that

and the total perspective vortex
you mentioned earlier,

and the point of view gun.

– This whole perspective thing...
– [Robbie] It is, isn't it?

One of the stories I always love,
that Douglas used to tell very simply,

was that... He had this deep desire

that the human species should
have a little bit more humility

about its place in the great scheme
of things than we do.

The image he used,
classic brilliance, was the puddle.

A puddle wakes up one morning
and looks at the whole it's in

and thinks, "This whole fits me nicely,
it must've been made specially for me."

And continues to believe that
as the sun burns the puddle away.

What a simple, clear way.

And the way that this coming
Guide entry ends,

the last line, I talked earlier about
a brilliant coda for the whole movie,

"Things are not always what they seem."

The very last line of this Guide entry
is another great clue

to the things that really fascinated
Douglas intellectually and creatively.

[Guide] ...anywhere without
my wonderful towel",

a freak wormhole opened up in
the fabric of the space-time continuum

and carried his words far,
far back in time,

across almost infinite reaches of space,
to a distant galaxy

where strange and warlike beings
were poised on the brink

of frightful interstellar battle.

The two opposing leaders, resplendent
in their black-jeweled battle shorts...

[Sean] This is one of the things that,
apparently, in the...

one of the things
in the Infocom text adventure game,

uh, Douglas wanted this gag.

He wanted a particular phrase
to drift through time and end up here.

And he thought, "What should it be?"

And it's actually, the first thing you
type that the game doesn't understand.

So the first mistake you make then
appears way further on in the game,

to be the thing that triggers this.

This was absolutely classic Douglas,
he really wanted to do that,

and the developers at Infocom said,
"No, that's not gonna work."

"Well, unless you... Ooh, ah, yes."

And basically, I believe, changed
their engine to incorporate this gag,

that Douglas wanted to put in there.

[Guide] Those who study the complex
interplay of cause and effect

in the history of the universe

say that this sort of thing
is going on all the time.

[Robbie] There we go, those last lines,
"the complex interplay".

Douglas's fascination with endless
possibilities and perspective shifting.

I'm very glad that those are
the last lines in the movie.

Starting with those lines,
"Things are not always what they seem,"

we've almost come full circle really.

Starting with
"Things are not always what they seem,"

and with those last lines
we've come full circle, intellectually,

with all the things
that most fascinated Douglas.

And still the credits roll.
Everybody worked so hard.

One of the remarkable things was that
the production accountant, for example,

was a huge Hitchhiker fan.

You could have really knowledgeable
discussions with him.

Everybody who worked on this picture,

we were all aware just how special
the material we were working on was,

and what a unique privilege it was

to have a chance to bring your
particular skill, whatever it was,

to bear on something
as wildly unique and original

as The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Thank you, Douglas.

[Sean] One of the things we used
to do at The Digital Village,

Douglas was constantly being interviewed
for Starship Titanic and H2G2,

and that sort of thing is hell
for an author or a creative person,

having to parrot out
the same thing again and again.

And we came up with...
I don't think we ever told him.

...the Douglas Adams drinking game,

which is,
every one of these little bits,

getting evolution in there or whatever,

you had to take a drink.

Watching this film,
with all the references,

the fact that it just
absolutely oozes Douglas,

you wouldn't last long at all playing
the Douglas Adams drinking game on this.

We'll put the rules
on the Internet somewhere.