4 Pulses
Starring Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Timothy Dalton, Jim Broadbent
Directed by Edgar Wright
Rated R
On the heels of Grindhouse comes English import Hot Fuzz, a blissfully silly cop farce that’s every bit the double feature as the recent 1970s-themed extravaganza.
Following up on their droll zombie romp, Shaun of the Dead, director Edgar Wright (who contributed the spot-on ’Don’t’ trailer for Grindhouse) and co-writer/star Simon Pegg spend the first hour of Hot Fuzz crafting a wry British comedy before careening into a exciting bullet-ridden third act.
In less-disciplined hands, the two styles would have clashed, but Wright and friends balance Hot Fuzz with the proper amount of zany humor and kinetic energy.
Nicholas Angel (Pegg) is an overzealous London cop who’s been unceremoniously promoted for making his fellow officers pale in comparison. Nicholas is sent packing to the sleepy hamlet of Sanford, where he meets up with wide-eyed constable Danny Butterman (Frost).
Danny pictures Nicholas as one of those supercops he idolizes in American movies. But Nicholas sees Danny, and the rest of the town, as na’ve buffoons.
Such yokels as police chief Frank Butterman (Broadbent), who prefers serving dessert in the station over filling out paper work, and supermarket magnate Simon Skinner (Dalton) irritate Nicholas with their amiability.
However, it’s not long before locals begin to die under mysterious circumstances. Nicholas’s inquiries are met with an eerie calm. Since Sanford proudly promotes its miniscule crime rate, these deaths are chalked up as mere accidents.
As Nicholas digs deeper, he uncovers a town festering with malice among its elite. Nicholas and Danny are called upon to foil these capers, and they unleash a bit of the ultra-violence that would make Bruce Willis (or Malcolm McDowell) proud.
As seen in Shaun of the Dead, Pegg and Frost rekindle their delightful on-screen rapport. Their relationship gives Hot Fuzz the depth most satires sorely lack.
The credible supporting cast (all the way down to a blink-and-you missed-him Peter Jackson) help Hot Fuzz succeed as both a screwball comedy and as a nihilistic shoot-’em up.
Wright does his part by giving a nodding wink to every Hollywood action movie from Point Break to Bad Boys II. But, like friends Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, he shows veneration for the films he’s referencing.
That admiration is what sets this team apart from most parody troops. Hot Fuzz accomplishes something that’s actually quite remarkable: It playfully reinvents the genre it’s lampooning.
