It would sound like a schoolyard taunt to posit that Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg, creators of Shaun of the Dead and now Hot Fuzz, love movies so much that they want to marry them. But that’s actually what they do, wedding their chosen genres to a British comic sensibility heavy on the mundane. Here they get cozy with cop movies when straight-arrow Nicholas Angel (Pegg) is transferred from London to the quaint village of Sandford and partnered with an eager-to-please local schlub (Nick Frost). Their relationship is only a little more romantic than those found in most action pictures.
Fuzz has a more pleasing trajectory than its predecessor — Shaun’s best gags were spent during its set-up, while the new film saves a lot of ammo for an extended payoff — but both films are more sly and amusing than riotous. It’s the filmmakers’ undying affection that carries the film far above rote spoof territory. Date Movie and Epic Movie must look like tiny ants from up there.
Opens April 20
Fuzz has a more pleasing trajectory than its predecessor — Shaun’s best gags were spent during its set-up, while the new film saves a lot of ammo for an extended payoff — but both films are more sly and amusing than riotous. It’s the filmmakers’ undying affection that carries the film far above rote spoof territory. Date Movie and Epic Movie must look like tiny ants from up there.
Opens April 20
