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The Bargain Nexus - The Hogfather
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List Price: $14.95
Our Price: $8.07
Your Save: $ 6.88 ( 46% )
Availability: Usually ships in 9 to 13 days
Manufacturer: Genius Products (TVN)
Starring: Neil Pearson, Tony Robinson, David Jason, Stephen Marcus, Joss Ackland
Directed By: Vadim Jean
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
Brand: WELLSPRING/GENIUS
EAN: 0796019806046
Format: AC-3
Label: Genius Products (TVN)
Manufacturer: Genius Products (TVN)
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Genius Products (TVN)
Region Code: 1
Release Date: 2008-03-04
Running Time: 189
Studio: Genius Products (TVN)
Theatrical Release Date: 2006
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Twas the night before Hogswatch
Comment: Twas the night before Hogwatch, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring... because the only person stirring was Death in a Hogsfather costume.
And fortunately the BBC's first live-action adventure in Terry Pratchett's Discworld is a brilliant affair -- faithful, hilarious, and full of intricate plotting and gutsplitting satire. It also manages to mingle the unsentimental observations about human nature with a feel-good message -- not an easy thing to do, especially in a Christmas-related movie.
On the night before Hogswatch, the Auditors enlist the Assassins' Guild for a very special job: "delete" the Hogfather. For this, Lord Downey calls on the psychotically childlike Mr. Teatime (Marc Warren), who has already figured out ways to kill the Hogfather, Soulcake Duck, and even Death. Soon Death (Ian Richardson) finds that the Hogfather has vanished --and takes on the Hogfather's duties for the night, much to the disgust of his granddaughter Susan (Michelle Dockery).
But realizing that something is very seriously wrong with the world, Susan begins investigating the origins of the Hogfather, and the terrible reasons that he has vanished. Mr. Teatime and a locksmith, wizard and trio of thieves have infiltrated the Tooth Fairy's castle and have somehow contrived to erase the Hogfather. And the wizards -- after opening a lethal bathroom for the bombastic Ridcully (Joss Ackland) -- learn that strange creatures are coming into existence, such as the Verruca Gnome and the Eater of Socks (not to mention Bilious, the Oh God of Hangovers).
Now Susan must somehow find a way to bring back the Hogfather -- or else despite all Death's best efforts ("And what do you want, small human?") the world will lose much more than a jolly fat anthropomorphic personification.
Watching "The Hogfather," it's pretty obvious that the people involved loved the the original book It's extremely faithful to the original Terry Pratchett novel (including in-jokes and cameos) and has the same offbeat weirdness ("TO THE LAUNDRY!"). And while the four main subplots seem scattered and sometimes unclear, as the movie goes on they intertwine tightly and suddenly become very relevant to one another.
And since this is based on a Pratchett book, we're graced with some cynical views on humanity and the nature of belief -- and occasionally touching moments, like Death rescuing a little match girl. There's even a bittersweet edge near the end when Susan confronts the core of the Tooth Fairy's castle, and finds something very unexpected there.
But along the way, we're treated to plenty of hilarious dialogue ("Have you been a good l... a good n... a good individual?"), wildly bizarre slapstick moments (Ridcully scalding himself with Old Faithful) and in-jokes (the inventions of Bloody Stupid Johnson). Barely a scene goes by without something to laugh at, whether it's Teatime's hysterically sick behavior or Death's attempts at yuletide jollity (including a list of things to do at each house, ending with a halfhearted "ho ho ho").
The brilliant comedy hits a high note when Death invades a shopping mall so he can have the children tell him what they want ("And be good. This is part of the arrangement." "All right!" "Then we have a contract"), much to the dismay of the store owner ("He's sitting in his grotto, bold as brass... GIVING AWAY PRESENTS!"
Dockery makes a magnificent Susan -- a little chilly, very strong-willed and determined to be as normal as possible. Warren is a delightfully creepy Teatime with his mismatched eyes and childish voice, and the late Ian Richardson was simply great as Death, whether he's being benevolent or sinister ("Have you been naughty... OR NICE?"). In fact all the actors do a brilliant job -- the wizards, the thieves, and the weird little kids that Susan babysits.
"The Hogfather" is a Christmas movie with a Discworld edge -- meaning it's funny and unique, but also riddled with deeper messages and sharp satire. Definitely a must-see during the holidays.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Much Is Lost In Translation...
Comment: Part of the difficulties with translating a book to film is losing much of what the author tries to convey. Books allow the writer to squeeze in much more character information and wit, while films must do so in (usually) under two hours. Thankfully this duology expands that time line a tad to a much needed three hours and nine minutes. I say much needed because author Terry Pratchett's books deserve the full treatment in terms of time. But, unfortunately, even with this extended amount, the story suffers in translation. Although I must give credit to direct Vadim Jean (who also did the screenplay adaption and continues to adapt Mr. Pratchett's excellent Discworld series), it's tough to give a ravingly positive review to something that I enjoyed only marginally as much as the written works.
I remember sitting in a restaurant on a meal break one day and having portions of a ham sandwich fly from my nose while reading Hogfather. Death (in the film voiced very well by Ian Richardson, Becoming Jane) is a central character, and both the book and the movie keep it that way. But what is lost is the clever witticisms of the narrator (Pratchett) that often causes the reader to nearly choke with restrained laughter while trying to keep from puking or inhaling food particles. It was, however, pretty funny to see Death cloaked in Santa (i.e., Hogfather) garb while mushing a sleigh towed by heavily-tusked boars.
Marc Warren (Wanted) as Mr. Teatime was a good choice, as he had just the right amount of ruthlessness (which was plenty) and naiveté (toward his fellow Discworld inhabitants) to make him a fearfully funny antagonist.
However, from here things get off-track. Michelle Dockery plays Susan, the main protagonist, but is mostly lost amidst the larger story. Her part was vital in the novel, but here we simply don't see that much of her in terms of character development. Beating up monsters under the bed? Funny, yes. Trying to protect her scythe-wielding relative? Okay, pretty funny. But what of the rest of her development? In truth, there isn't any in the film. She simply rushes off to help save Hogswatch Eve without much knowledge as to why she's so gung-ho to do it.
The remaining characters are also given excessively abbreviated versions, which made the entire film much less laughable. Indeed, I think I only chuckled a few times during the entire three-plus hours, showing just how much was lost in translation.
I will say, again, that I don't blame writer/director Vadim Jean for this. Without a doubt, this is a tough sell. How can you make something so densely funny as one of Mr. Pratchett's wonderful Discworld books into a guffaw-riddled flick? I think the simple answer is that you can't. And I think this adaptation proves it. But I will give Mr. Jean credit for trying. He succeeded on a very small level but I fear those that haven't read the novels might be less-than-impressed.
Sorry guys.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Truly love this movie!
Comment: This is truly an interesting and different take on the Santa Claus story set in an alternate universe. It's fun to watch Marc Warren in a truly creepy role. My favorite line in the movie: "...hello inner child, meet the inner babysitter." It's a fun alternative to traditional sappy Christmas movies, although I don't recommend it for small children.
Customer Rating:
Summary: one of my all-time favorite dvds
Comment: I absolutely love anything and everything pertaining to discworld; I have 2 characters on the Discworld online game, one of which is a newbie helper. I've listened to every single one of the discworld books at least twice, and preordered the Colour of Magic DVD from Amazon.uk the very second I possibly could. With all that being said, I simply had to get my hands on this movie as soon as I heard it existed. Fortunately, I have a region free DVD player, so I ended up purchasing the region 2 2 disc edition of Hogfather. I can't say enough about how much I love this movie. It is very faithful to the book; in a lot of cases, dialogue is word for word out of the book, something which, at least in my humble opinion, is all to rare in book to movie adaptations. Another treat for me was that Nigel Planer, the narrator of the first 23 Discworld audio books, played the part of Sidney the wizard in the movie. As if that wasn't awesome enough, David Jason, who is currently one of my two favorite actors along side Hugh Laurie, played the part of Albert brilliantly. I thought that Ian Richardson did a fantastic job as the voice of death; he sounded just like I would imagine Death sounding from the books. Evrything I've already mentioned would be more than enough to earn this movie 5 stars as far as I'm concerned, but the real icing on the cake, for me at least, was when I discovered that the region 2 version of the Hogfather DVD which I had purchased included audio description for visually impaired viewers. As a blind individual, this fact in and of itself immediatley catipolted the Hogfather DVD into my top 10 favorites. It was great to know everything that was going on,
while still watching the movie by myself. Further more, I was able to watch this movie with a blind friend, and even though he knew nothing about discworld, he was still able to follow what was going on and ended up enjoying it almost as much as I did. I'm planning to share this movie with my parents over the Christmas/Hogswatch holiday and hope that they'll enjoy it too. If I were forced to come up with something negative to say about this DVD, the only thing I could possibly consider a flaw, and I'll be the first to admit that it's hardly even worth mentioning, is that I think that Tony Robinson should have played the part of Knobby Knobs; just based on the fact that he played the
part of Baldrick in Black Adder. I could be completely off base on wanting that change, though, so please feel free to take my opinion regarding that issue with a pound or two of salt.
In all seriousness, however, I would most definitely rate this movie adaptation of Hogfather 10 stars. I don't know if audio description is available on the US edition of Hogfather, but I would certainly hope so. In my humble opinion, audio description should be as readily available as closed captioning, but that's not at all relevant to this review. Incidentally, I just got the Region 2 DVD for The Colour of Magic, which is even better than Hogfather,and it also includes audio description.
Bottom line: If you even remotely enjoy good British humor, fantasy, discworld or if you're just in the market for a different kind of Christmas movie, this DVD is an absolute must buy.
In closing, I can't help adding that if you enjoyed this movie and end up becoming a discworld fan, if you're already a discworld fan or even if you just enjoy online gaming, you should come and visit the discworld online game. The address is discworld.atuin.net port 4242. My characters, Eponine and Ramie would be more than happy to talk with or help out any newcomers to the game.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Hogfather
Comment: As a big Disk World fan I was worried that the film would not be faithful to the book. Thanks to the magic of the disk, I was not disappointed. The film is as close to verbatim as the constraints of time and technology allow. Every character and situation is rendered wonderfully. I now know what Nobby Nobbs looks like, for example...er, taking into account the fact that they made the artistic decision to use a real human being to play him, that is.
Get it! If you know the disk world, you will be welcomed home. If not, you will want to visit again. I have ordered three additional copies to be given as stocking suffers this coming Hogswatch Eve.
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Editorial Reviews:
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Hogfather is the magical, menacing, wicked, and witty family story unlike anything else you could ever imagine. From the imagination of best-selling author Terry Pratchett comes Hogfather. It’s the holiday of Hogswatch, the night when kids anticipate presents from the beloved Hogfather. But someone wants the Hogfather out of the way. Now it’s up to the most unlikely of heroes to get the holiday back on track. Just in time for the Easter season, Hogfather is a cross between Chronicles of Narnia and Harry Potter that’s sure to be a family favorite you’ll be watching for years and years to come.
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