Caught by the Fuzz
By SteveHot Fuzz is a goofy send-up of action movies from the folks responsible for the equally goofy—and possibly better—Shaun of the Dead. It’s an over-the-top action movie in the Michael Bay mold, full of useless fast cuts, incomprehensible fight scenes, and as much homoeroticism as the truly horrific Bad Boys II. (It even has a bunch of inexplicable homages to the legendary Point Break with Keanu Reeves and an equally “whoa”-tastic Patrick Swayze.) It’s also laugh-out-loud funny.
Shaun of the Dead star (and co-writer) Simon Pegg plays Nicholas Angel, who’s such a great London cop that he makes everyone else look so bad and is sent back to a picturesque small town with no crime. It helps for the audience to be a bit of an Anglophile, as the small-town London setting is full of the usual eccentrics, gardeners, a bizarre version of Romeo & Juliet that somehow involves The Cardigan’s “Love Fool,” and a renegade swan that Pegg and Frost are unable to bring to justice. Oh, and a lot of incredibly graphic deaths.
The first half of the movie is Pegg and co-star Nick Frost running around town, with the possibly retarded Frost character constantly talking about all of this favorite action scenes. It’s inevitable that things will go all to hell in the second half of the movie, as they get to act out many of those very scenes, usually with painfully funny conclusions.
If there’s a flaw with Hot Fuzz it’s that most action movies have already become so self-aware and silly that a lot of the gags in Hot Fuzz will probably be in the next Die Hard. Though maybe not the priest packing some serious heat and the old lady that Pegg gives a flying kick to the face; that might be too much for even Bruce Willis.