It's like Thandie Newton starting shooting this one day after she finished a Holocaust film

Rating: 4/10 (11 October 2010)

This is a comedy made by some talented comedians who appear to have suffered some sort of humor amnesia and forgot how to tell a joke while making this film. I t's inconsistent, stuttering, shallow and doesn't understand that we've heard most of this joke before.
Dennis Doyle (Simon Pegg) is a fairly big loser. 5 years ago, he ran out on his very lovely and very pregnant girlfriend Libby (Thandie Newton) on their wedding day. Now, he's a part-time dad to their son Jake (Matthew Fenton), a security guard at a lingerie shop, living in someone's basement like a college student taking his senior year for the 4th year in a row and sporting a pot belly like a Vietnamese pig. But when Libby starts dating the handsome, rich and seemingly perfect Witt (Hank Azaria), Dennis is finally inspired to do something with his life. In Dennis' case, that something is run and finish the London marathoneven though the race is in 3 weeks, the deadline to enter has passed and Dennis is in about as good of shape as a professional doughnut taster. Assisted by his best friend Gordon (Dylan Moran) and his fat, Indian landlord Mr. G (Harish Patel), Dennis sets out to prove to Libby and to himself that he can see something all the way through.
That's only a basic outline of the plot of Run Fatboy Run but just off that, you could probably describe to me about 80% of what happens in this movie, scene by scene and almost word for word. This is an underdog story we've all seen many, many times before and there is absolutely no imagination brought to this version of it. There is not a single unexpected moment or surprise in the whole thing.
Even a formulaic movie can be enjoyable if the formula is well executed, but it isn't in this case. Run Fatboy Run is waaaaaay too long, veers haphazardly from broad slapstick to quieter humor, screws up either the set up or the punch line of too many of its jokes and even messes up the big, heartfelt ending these films are always supposed to have. There are some funny moments but most of them are so disconnected from the story, they could be transplanted into dozens of other movies and be just as funny.
There are so many elements that are simply "off". The film can never decide if Dennis Doyle is supposed to be funny or if he's supposed to be the normal point that funny stuff happens around. The movie starts with a guy leaving a pregnant woman at the altar, but then skips ahead 5 years and never shows us any of the real anger and heartache such an act would have produced. The script also piles one incentive on top of another for Dennis to finish the race to where you can't believe for even a second that it won't happen. There might as well have been subtitles on the bottom of the screen saying "Here's yet another reason Dennis will have to overcome that moment of doubt we all know is coming and accomplish his dream".
I'd also like to point out that Thandie Newton is quite beautiful, but she's also rather disconcerting because she appears to be constructed out of pipe cleaners and toothpicks. She seems to be a naturally thin woman who's lost that 10 to 15 pounds they always ask you to lose in Hollywood, with the result that she looks like a fashion model who just escaped from a forced labor camp.
Run Fatboy Run is a walking, talking cinematic cliché. It desperately needed filmmakers who would try something unconventional with it. Instead, they churned out another generic, empty, Hollywood concoction.