| Product: |
Hot Fuzz (Special Edition, 2 DVDs) |
| Date: |
01/01/08 (124 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Great script, very funny film
Disadvantages: Bit on the long side at 2hrs
Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) is best in class. Dedicated, dynamic and meticulous with detail, he's breaking police records all over the place. With an arrest record four times better than anyone else, his superiors decide that he's making everyone else look bad and so he gets promoted to Sergeant and posted to the safest spot in the country: the village of Sandford. Quickly getting into action, Angel clears the local pub of under age drinkers, eyes graffiti on a fountain and runs a local in for threatening to drive whilst under the influence. Things look even less exciting when he meets the team he'll be working with at the station. Under the watchful eye of Inspector Frank Butterman (Jim Broadbent), the local constabulary is made up of misfits and n'er do wells including Butterman's son and Angel's new partner in crime-busting, Danny Butterman (Nick Frost). Charged with tracking down a missing swan, the duo stumble upon a series of accidents resulting in a string of local deaths. Convinced that something is afoot, Angel utilizes his considerable policing talents to uncover a sinister plot that threatens to derail the sleepy village and reveal the fate of his predecessor.
"Hot Fuzz" is a 2007 action comedy film written by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright and re-unites the leads from the previous box office smash "Shaun of the Dead". Whereas SOTD was a homage to zombie flicks, this latest partnership takes the genre of buddy cop movies and parodies it with no small measure of love and attention. There are aspects of the movie open to criticism. The run time of 121 mins is on the long side with a potentially overblown finale. You could even claim that the rural setting makes the whole cops and robbers thing seem absurd at times. On reflection, though and having taken in the whole comic scenario, for so many reasons, "Hot Fuzz" is the funniest comedy movie in years.
All the hallmarks of the Edgar Wright/Simon Pegg filmmaking style are present in the movie. There's the immaculate comic timing that comes with a carefully thought out script with wonderful delivery from a cornucopia of British comedy talent. For anyone that's traced Pegg's rise to fame then the surreal, quick motion links that come with a whooshing noise first seen in the comedy series "Spaced" and then again in SOTD are present once more; there's the situational comedy aspect of taking something relatively mundane and exaggerating it for comedy effect (e.g. the scenes with the hoodies and especially the shoot out at the finale) and the customary deadbeat, comedy duo act so reminiscent of the classic comedy partnerships from movie yesteryear (think Abbott and Costello, Laurel and Hardy).
The supporting cast is outstanding. With Bill Bailey on duty at reception in the police station, Jim Broadbent making the team buy rounds of cakes as punishment for misdemeanors and Timothy Dalton as a gloriously over-the-top, mustachioed supermarket owner, the leads get wonderful apathy in their pursuit of the coweled killer. Having realized that the drunk about to get into a car and drive off from the previous night is, in fact, the son of the station inspector and a fellow police officer, Angel looks around, staring at the police team eating cake. Angel: "Why is everyone eating chocolate cake?" Inspector Butterman: "The Black Forest gateau is on Danny, as punishment for his little indiscretion." Angel: "His...? Sir, I don't think driving under the influence can be called a "little indiscretion." Inspector Butterman: "No, the gateau is for misplacing his helmet the other week. Last night's incident will require something a rather more serious. Do you like ice cream?" It's vintage retro-Ealing comedy with small town humour and a nod to English village life, brought to screen so vividly by the cinematography of Jess Hall.
As ever, the chemistry between Pegg and Frost is irisistible with Frost's comic indifference the perfect foil for Pegg's over exuberance. The heart of the film and the essence of their professional motives is captured in the scene where Butterman Junior invites his partner back to his digs. With the click of a button, a door slides open to reveal a huge collection of DVDs and the two sit down to watch the Keanu Reeves/Patrick Swayze blockbuster "Point Break". As the DVD film's lead fires his gun into the air with an anguished cry, both men inhale and fire up on adrenaline and it's this obvious love of movies that appears to have inspired both this one and the previous hit, SOTD. The scene also provides the link with the plot that unravels with a lovely twist to the motive uncovered by the hyperactive Angel. The film's score is by British composer David Arnold, best known for his work on the James Bond movies and with a heady mix of 60's and 70's rock (The Kinks, T-Rex, The Move), the film's frenetic action is underlined by crashing, classic rock.
The finale to the movie takes "Hot Fuzz" onto a different level with one of the most ridiculously funny shoot outs in film history. Complete with American slow mo, rolling through the air, pumping bullets shots to THE bizarrest of shoot 'em up scenarios and settings, Wright and Pegg proceed to tear the place down with a beautifully conceived sequence that ties up loose ends and brings the movie full circle from its humble beginnings.
"Hot Fuzz" is rated 15 with scenes of violence and bad language and is for adults and older children only. It's a very funny movie and probably the best comedy film I've seen in quite a while. With a brilliant blend of action and offbeat humour, the movie's star could almost be re-establishing a renaissance of comedy last seen in the silent era of Buster Keaton. Slap stick, knockabout, sight gags and great one-liners, "Hot Fuzz" is first rate comedy gold and well worth a couple of hours of your time.
Thanks for reading
Mara.
DVD available at Amazon from £7.97
Summary: Overview of movie
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