Rent it

Rating: 5/10 (4 May 2007)

I finally saw Hot Fuzz yesterday.
As the HF filmmakers want to point out "from the guys who created Shaun of the Dead", audiences and critics will naturally compare and critique against the success of SOTD. I love SOTD, preach and advocate it, and often carry a copy (to lend to others who haven't seen it of course). As a fan I had high expectations for Fuzz, maybe too high as Fuzz misses the bar. Reasons: the Fuzz homage seemed more like a tribute/reunion to SOTD than to the police/buddy cop genre (unsure why gore needs to be in a comedy cop movie...unnecessary excess), too many characters that weren't that interesting, weak storyline, the overall pacing was too slow, to the point that even the few funny parts wheren't all that funny (I found myself hoping that Simon/Nick would get funnier), and the big climatic gunfight was pure fromage.
It was interesting that "the guys who created SOTD" chose to reference Point Break and Bad Boys 2. Royalties...hmm? Nevertheless the references were so played up that the upcoming scenes became predictable (keanu shooting/emptying his gun in the air when he couldn't fire on fleeing swayze...actually watching Nick in this scene was kinda funny).
I wanted to like Fuzz and although it was good to see the chemistry of Simon and Nick together again on the big screen, that only gets you a 5 rating. Disappointing boyz.