From the Salmon

The Oscars seemed fairly uninteresting this year. Perhaps it was because we only saw one of the films nominated for Best Picture. Honestly, the only award I was really pulling for was Charlie Kauffman for his Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind screenplay.

Fortunately, I reccntly stumbled across two sets of trailers that have me excited about the movie year to come. Only one of the movies looks Oscar-worthy. I’ll let you figure out which.

I must admit that I’m pretty nervous about the forthcoming film adaptation of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, if only because I adore the books. But now that I’ve seen the first two trailers, I’m actually getting excited. The second trailer pokes fun at movie trailers in general (not quite at the level of the brilliant Comedian trailer, but its still funny in its own right).

Martin Freeman is a great choice for Arthur, although I’m worried that I might not be able to see him as anything but Tim from The Office. I’m a little less sold on the casting for Zaphod and Ford. I imagine that Zaphod will be the toughest character to get across onscreen. And while Sam Rockwell seems to get the attitude right in the trailers (when he’s not sounding like Shaggy), I never got a good look at his extra, um, features. And I know next to nothing about Mos Def, so Ford remains a big question mark for me.

Now they could still screw this one up royally. But so far, I’ve seen no cause for panic. I really should read the books one last time before the movie changes my ability to visualize them on my own.

I have absolutely no conflicting feelings about the second movie — just unmitigated joy. This fall marks the release of The Wallace & Gromit Movie: Curse of the Wererabbit! The official site has a behind-the-scenes glimpse. But that pales in comparison to the first trailer (note: this links directly to a Windows Media Video file). The gag at the end makes me laugh every time.

I have to say, it doesn’t hurt every now and then to start your day with a little unbridled glee. (Glee courtesy of Looking Closer.)

Update: Looking Closer again comes through with the glee, linking to a splendiferous 52mb Quicktime version of the second Hitchhiker’s trailer (note: direct link to Quicktime file). Wow.