I really enjoyed it, as evidenced by the fact that my face hurt from smiling by the time it was over.
It was not perfect, but then what adaptation of a book ever is? And this wasn't even an adaptation of a book - it was an adaptation of a radio show that was made into a book that was made into an album that was made into a television series.
I thought the casting was very good, except perhaps for Trillian, who was a bit lackluster. On another forum I read someone complaining that Arthur didn't look the way he was described in the book (always a silly complaint IMHO), but I just reread the description of him this morning and I think Martin Freeman was fine. I am now thoroughly a fan of Bill Nighy - he's just great.
My fiancee thinks they ought to have limited the number of jokes they were trying to reproduce and fleshed out what remained - for example, making the Vogon poetry sequence a bit longer, as well as Arthur and Ford's arrival on the Heart of Gold. We did really find it amusing that the Vogon destructor fleet captain was sitting on a chair shaped like a squashed deer - that's a little reference back to the book that even I didn't get until my fiancee reminded me.
I'm not sure I could agree that people who aren't familiar with the books would "get" this movie. I think most of the people here who haven't read the books or seen the tv series at least know something about the story. People who know nothing about it would probably find it a bit more impenetrable.
But oh, how can you not love Stephen Fry as the voice of the Guide?
