Hot Fuzz

I was not sure what to expect from this movie that I found on Netflix a while ago while browsing through the catalog. The movie poster makes it look like a hard-boiled police action movie but reading the reviews it became clear that it was more of a comedy. I had not heard of the movie before but it generally got good reviews so the other evening me and the boys sat down to watch it. This is a fun movie. A good, old-fashioned British comedy. The core story could very well have been a serious crime story but the way it is implemented makes it so incredibly silly in a fun way. It starts off pretty much right away when PC Angel is told that he will be promoted but moved, because he makes the rest if the bunch of the dimwits at the precinct look bad, to a small British town where the most fun you can have is to watch the grass grow or get drunk and from there it goes downhill for Angel. His new colleagues are somewhat weird not to mention more or less useless when it comes to police work. The by-the-book Angel is getting more and more frustrated and his only friend is the son of his new boss, whom he arrested on the first day by the way. When the grizzly “accidents” starts to happen the movie, in particular the explanations as to why they are “accidents” and not crimes, become more and more absurd. The special effects guys seems to have learned a trick or two from the Monty Python gang when it comes to over the top gory blood splattered scenes by the way. In the final showdown between Angel and the totally whacko gang that keeps the town “clean” by deadly serious methods is short references to great many action movies. The amount of shots fired and the ratio of misses versus actual hits is nothing short of ludicrous. It was just so absurdly funny that it is difficult to describe. If you are in the mood for some good solid British comedy then I can recommend this one. It is a very well done comedy and a lot more enjoyable than the get drunk and/or fall on your arse and/or and puke all over the place “comedies” that comes thirteen to the dozen today.

A victim of his own meticulous success, “Angel” (Simon Pegg) is promoted to sergeant but relocated from the metropolis to a remote rural constabulary where he anticipates that nothing much will go wrong under the watchful eye of “Insp. Butterman” (Jim Broadbent). Less than impressed with this enforced relocation, he arrives in a town where everyone already knows who he is and where the pub with fellow cop, the younger ”Butterman” (Nick Frost), where he downs some orange juice before bed in his hotel room is his only real diversion. One night, though, the pair are to be representatives of the police at a local am-dram effort where the two stars are obviously more than just “colleagues”. Next morning, though, they are not even that when their decapitated bodies are found next to their car following what the pretty hapless CID think is just an accident. “Angel” thinks otherwise, though, and as he starts to investigate he starts to smell a rat. Well, quite a few rats, as it happens the body count starts to quite spectacularly mount up and things become quite hairy for him and his pal as this sleepy town becomes more like “Sleepy Hollow”. Might the suave local supermarket manager (Timothy Dalton) be behind it? Or the pub owner (Peter Wright)? Maybe it’s his landlady (Billie Whitelaw) or even the vicar (Paul Freeman)? With no absence of suspects, can they get to the bottom of this murderous mystery? It isn’t that far removed from “Shaun of the Dead” (2004), this film, only there aren’t any zombies marauding about for them to shoot. There is still plenty to aim at as this takes a fun pot-shot at all things rural from old grudges to planning applications, land deals and there’s even a bit of cultism thrown in for good measure. It’s the chemistry between Pegg and Frost that holds this together well as they deliver a pithy and amiable script whilst the rest of the cast do their best to deliver the sort of villagers that Agatha Christie would have relished in creating. It does take it’s time to end, but for most of it’s two hours it moves along quickly and entertainingly.

Buckle up, buttercup - you're gonna see things beyond imagination, especially if you've never waded into these completely over-the-top waters before. The 'moderate violence' part of the tagline is sort of on target: no one's brains are blown out, nobody pitches face-first into a woodchipper,or gets run straight over by a train. Otherwise - SPOILER ALERT - people are creatively dispatched by falling mortar and other ingenious (and inglorious) means. The second half of this utter insanity is like a hysterical mashup of Pulp Fiction and The Blues Brothers, with a dash of Monte Python thrown in for good measure - you can't believe a single thing that happens, and you're not supposed to! Gleeful absurdity abounds, but with a decent moral core, as well as an unwillingness to fully dispatch any of the various villains (bonus points for the most fiendishly creative use of a steeple I could imagine!). I never imagined I could like this, but here we are!