Tuesday’s Overlooked Film: Hot Fuzz (2007)

Fans of Edgar Wright will recognize his name from works such as:

• Shaun of the Dead
• Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
• and the television series, Spaced.

Here he is with frequent collaborators Simon Pegg and Nick Frost for the 2007 black comedy Hot Fuzz. It is essentially a send-up of the buddy cop genre.

Nicholas Angel (Pegg) is a police officer with the Metropolitan Police of London. He is a “super-cop,” which oddly enough does not sit well with his supervisors (there is such a thing as being TOO good).  As a result, he is sent off to the sleepy English village of Sanford, where it is supposed that he will not have to worry about any criminal activity. In Sanford he is partnered with Danny Butterman (Nick Frost) who is in awe of his new partner’s big city prowess. The other members of the Sanford Police force (headed by Jim Broadbent as Frank Butterman, Danny’s father) are not as impressed by the big-city import.

The rest of Sanford’s citizenry welcome Nicholas with varying degrees of acceptance. The town’s characters are an interesting lot to say the least. Of particular significance especially at the beginning of Nicholas’ investigations is Simon Skinner (the wonderful Timothy Dalton) manager of a local grocery store.

All is quite until a series of suspicious deaths draw the attention of Angel.  He soon discovers that while the crime rate (and murders) are nil, Sanford has a high number of deaths by accident or suicide in its records. After some snooping around he discovers an appalling secret about “The Village of the Year.”

As a measure of how much I liked this film, I cannot tell you how many times I have watched it and continuously laughed at what I saw. The surprise cameos (see how many you can count) are well worth the price of admission.

For the uninitiated, one thing that I bring to a potential viewer’s attention is the fact that there is a great deal of bloody violence in the film despite its overall comedic tone.

Personally this was my first complete entree into world of Edgar Wright. Since then I have watched bits of “Spaced” and not all of Shaun of the Dead. On the strength of this outing I plan on completing the above and to sink my teeth into Scott Pilgrim vs The World.