Hitch Hikers Guide to the Skittle Alley

Every time I visit UGC Cardiff it brings back terrible memories of when I went to see ‘Matrix Revolutions’ last year. A bit psyched by the fact that it may of be able to redeem the tragedy which was ‘Matrix Reloaded’, I went to see it with some of the Glamorgan crew on its day of release. All was going as well as could be expected, until when 3/4 way through we were treated to a bit of a fight sequence and aerial acrobatics, which didn’t really seem to fit with what we had been watching, but could of been some sort of trendy ‘dream sequence’. It became a bit clearer after 30 seconds or so of this show that this really didn’t make any sense and in fact when people started breaking through walls, talking backwards and walking upside down it was downright obvious what had happened. However, we were subjected to a further 1-2 mins of it before anyone bothered to sort it out, which took 20 or so minutes. Obviously we already knew what was going to happen when the scene was finally shown – we knew it back to front (ho ho). It’s just as well the film was rubbish or else I would of been really annoyed.

This evening however was a good experience at UGC, there’s a first. I went along to an advance screening of ‘The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy’ with Jon, Cathy and Katie. Keeping true to the original radio show, book and tv show’s got to be a hard job by any stretch of the imagination, but I think it was pulled off rather well. I like the way that we expanded on what we knew of the Vogon’s (“You’re supposed to Stop!”) and revealing Deep Thought was a bit of a couch potato, this always appeals. Marvin was also fantastic – though I disagree with the fact that some people seem to think he was under-used, anything more would of been too much. Admittedly it did feel a bit crammed and I agree that if you hadn’t read, heard or seen any of Adams’ stuff before you would probably be fairly lost. I wish in fact I hadn’t read the book so recently, it spoilt so much of the film as a lot of the script was word for word from it.

After this I went off for a housegroup social in the Crwys’s skittle alley..which was ever so slightly disappointing. I spent five minutes in the pub trying to find it (which involved pretending I needed the loo), as it was absolutely rammed to the brim. I guess I need to play it with mates back home who enjoy the more vicious version whereby throwing balls is permitted when skittles are being arranged or the balls are still being placed in the other end of the run. Much more exciting….