Idea: for a 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (2005) edit...

I just finished reading the book for like the zillionth time (it’s probably my all-time favorite) and I got to thinking about the 2005 movie. I liked certain elements of it, but I also had my gripes. For instance, I absolutely loved the casting. Martin Freeman was a perfect Arthur Dent, and Mos Def was great as Ford, etc. etc. But I didn’t like the added love story (just too “Hollywood”) and I didn’t care for all the stuff between when Arthur and Ford reach the Heart of Gold and Magrathea. I love the first and last third, but that middle part on the planet with the people worshiping the god who sneezed out the universe (an homage to the books) was silly and just didn’t fit with the rest of the film. Some of the new elements I loved, like the point of view gun, and the scene on the planet where every time they think one of those metal things hits them was very Douglas Adams-ish.

My question is, would someone be up for editing the movie to not entierly remove, but greatly shorten and improve the pacing of the middle third? There’s some gems in there, like what I mentioned, but much of it is hidden in the rough. I don’t have the tools or materials to do an edit myself, but there are probably lots of you who could really strike gold with this.

Basically, I’d want to cut out anything that doesn’t feel like it from the mind of Douglas Adams. He wrote the first drafts of the film, and someone else finished it. The parts where someone else wrote it just feels jarring compared to everything else, and that’s what I’d cut out.