message in the movies By Rev. Bruce Batchelor Glader

            
Hot Fuzz Rated R
Directed by Edgar Wright.  Starring Simon Pegg, Nick Frost

Photos © Rogue Pictures
Nicholas Angel (Pegg) is a good cop.  A little too good, in fact.  He is making all of the other London officers, including his immediate supervisors, look bad. He is promoted to head the police force in the small and friendly village of Sandford, in which most of the residents are inclined to look the other way when teens drink the occasional beer or when there is some minor code violation.  It’s all for “the greater good”.  Officer Angel will have none of that, and his officious demeanor begins to grate some of the citizens.  However, shortly after his arrival, mysterious deaths occur.  The locals consider them to be accidents.  Angel detects foul play, and with the help of his able assistant, Danny Butterman (Frost), begins to uncover some sinister goings-on-about town.  That’s the plot – and it’s actually a good one – but Hot Fuzz is also a hilarious tribute to two different film genres – the action buddy-cop movie popularized by producer Jerry Bruckheimer and the quaint English village mystery film.  There are many laughs in this film, and it is populated by many Grade-A List Brits, including Jim Broadbent, Timothy Dalton, and Edward Woodward.  Much can be said about how action films perpetuate a culture filled with gun violence and senseless death.  Perhaps one of the best ways of disarming the trend is to make fun of it and show how foolish everything actually is.  Hot Fuzz succeeds as comedy, mystery and parody, and Pegg and Frost (who also starred in Wright’s great 2004 zombie comedy “Shaun of the Dead”) make a great team.  The violence is often intense, but it is akin to the bloodletting in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”.  This is the funniest comedy of the year, so far.  ..

Pitchfork Rating: Three halos. (In the midst of this hilarious parody, there is growing friendship and a desire for moral order.)  Two pitchforks. (Occasional profanity and much extreme  violence.)

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