'Hot Fuzz'

Directed by: Edgar Wright
Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick
Frost, Martin Freeman, Timo-
thy Dalton, Bill Nighy
Rated: R (for mildly risqué
humor)
Running time: 122 minutes
Best suited for: fans of the
MTV-fueled, lightnin' paced
buddy cop flick; "Shaun of
the Dead" addicts
Least suited for: the oppo-
site of the above

While Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez have soaked up the limelight touting their parody of- excuse me, homage to- those old indie drivein exploitation shockers, along comes the Simon Pegg/Nick Frost parody of every MTVfueled, lightnin'-paced buddy cop flick ever made. And doing it on one-tenth of Tarantino's budget.

If the comedy duo of Pegg and Frost doesn't ring any bells, that's likely because you're not a thatched-hut resident of Stratford-on-Avon. Or perhaps you're not a connoisseur of flesh-ripping zombie flicks.

Back in '05, director Edgar Wright and British comedian Simon Pegg made a quaint little ditty called "Shaun of the Dead." Simon Pegg played the apathetic, titular Shaun (and, really, when was the last time you used titular in a sentence?), a typical British underachiever with girlfriend and mommy issues. So caught up was Shaun in his own morass that he and best buddy Ed (Nick Frost) didn't notice the living dead slowly taking over the neighborhood.

The result was a terrific- if occasionally bloody- slapstick farce, possibly one of the best parodies in filmdom. If you're even remotely a zombie fan (if such an on-the-fence position is possible), "Shaun's" a definitive addition to your living dead library. It's truly a classic.

Simon Pegg, again with best buddy Nick Frost and co-writer, director Edgar Wright, decided to plug that same formulaic magic into the buddy cop genre, and the results are- depending on your tastes- moderately to extremely rewarding.

This time, Pegg plays an overachiever- Sgt. Nicholas Angel, a dedicated London cop so good that he's making the rest of the force look bad. To get rid of him, his superiors ship him off to Sandford, a tiny village that boasts of the lowest crime level in Britain.

There he's paired up with local bumbling cop Danny Butterman. Soon, a rash of mysterious fatal accidents alarm Sgt. Angel, who begins to suspect foul play. From there on in, both the victims and the suspects begin to pile up.

If you're a fan of the buddy cop venue, you'll realize that Pegg and Frost parody scenes from quite a few cop flicks- probably far more than I could catch. They reenact scenes from "Bad Boys II" and "Point Break." Alert viewers will catch more subtle nods as well: "Forget it, Nick. It's Sandford" is a one-line knockoff from "Chinatown." The bear trap's right out of "Straw Dogs." The hooded cult members are reminiscent of "The Wickerman," and I suspect there to be dozens of such borrowed subtleties packed into "Hot Fuzz." If you're a fan of heart-thump films like "Snatch," "Layer Cake," "Formula 51" and "The Transporter," you shouldn't have any trouble loving this film, finding it just too sublime for words.

If there's a flaw, it's that, at a two-hour running time, the flick's a bit too long. Yes, there's a plot, a decent one, but it runs thin about 20 minutes early. The remainder of "Hot Fuzz" is mostly slapshot images of squealing tires and quick draws and shotgun blasts and exploding heads. Okay, head- singular, only one- and it's somewhat artistically done. But be forewarned that there are a few brief moments of graphic bloodshed.

The films also suffers, here in the Colonies, from a distinct British dialect. Or as Ethel Mertz once said over there, "We're sorry. We're American. We don't speak English."

The film, you see, is terribly British. Several of the lines, probably funny, went right over my American head. (Would subtitles have helped?) I had the same issue with films like "The Full Monty" and "Waking Ned Devine"- which didn't make them less wonderful experiences by any means; they just need a little more attention.

I suspect, like "Shaun of the Dead," this may be one film that improves with age and multiple viewings. Having seen "Lethal Weapon" numerous times won't hurt either.