Non-hilarious

Rating: 5/10 (4 January 2008)

Hot Fuzz is one of the most revered movies of the year, and especially in it's native Britain it has been the object of unparalleled praise. I for my part, find the HF-phenomena a bit strange. The reason is not that the movie is crap, it's just not that funny. I have no problem seeing what Pegg/Wright are trying to accomplish, and their target is a good one when fulfilled. However this is not the case, and HF ends up being caught in a vacuum between action, crazy comedy and splatter, instead of being a crazy action/splatter comedy. The action is OK but not mindblowing,the gore feels awkwardly misplaced, and most important; the comedy is not funny enough. I find myself slightly snickering in stead of belly-laughing. Although containing the ingredients, this movie fails to be hilarious, and a crazy-comedy short of hilarious is unfortunately a failure. Furthermore, as mentioned above, the gore-scenes are the gross-out, squirm-inducing kind, not the ludicrous, splatty, funny ones. The plot is not the most important thing of this genre, but I was surprised by the smalltown premise, after the promotion of HF as actioncomedy/buddy/police-parody, which usually are set in the city. In summary; I'm overall disappointed, both due to my own (maybe unfair)expectations of what kind of situations the movie would include, but also by the failure to deliver the gags that actually ARE in the movie.