Hot Fuzz plus 2 other short reviews

Hot Fuzz (***1/2)

Hot Fuzz is a loving tribute to the genre of over-the-top, Michael Bay style, explosive-filled cop dramas. The type of movie where physics and probability are of little to no consequence, and the main character always winds up the hero despite usually recklessly endangering dozens of people. It does for these sorts of movies what Shaun of the Dead did for zombie movies, which makes sense because it was written, directed, and acted by many of the same people.

The movie centers around Nicolas Angel, a cop in London who gets transferred to a one-horse down out in the country, simply because he's too good. He has a tireless devotion to his job and the best arrest record on the force, so much so that he's making everyone else looks bad. As the film begins, he tries to get accustomed to his new home of Sandford, meeting the various folksy inhabitants and his new co-workers. The police force in Sandford is much more lackadaisical, and understandably so, as there isn't much to do in the small town. Nicolas tries to shake off being such a fish out of water, and applies his knowledge from his London beat to his new assignment but it really doesn't work well. Where he used to be chasing down fleeing criminals, he now finds himself chasing around escaped swans. Futhermore, he finds himself frustrated with his well intentioned but mostly incompetent new parter, Danny.

The beginning of the movie is funny in its own right. Nicolas and Danny play off each other well, and all of the eccentric townspeople are-- one of which is a mustached Timothy Dalton--are great. But what the movie is going to be remembered for is its last half hour, where it intentionally becomes every bit as ridiculous as Bad Boys II and all the other movies its parodying with a series of preposterous action scenes. Nicolas eventually finds something is amiss in Sandford, and he has to set things right in the traditional Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer fashion. In a mere half hour, there are countless quotable one-liners and applause-inducing "Oh ****!" moments. It is absolutely spot on as a parody and is going to be referenced for years to come as one of the funniest sequences to any movie.

I think the last half hour really works because the movie up to that point is so docile. It's the payoff at the end after we've gotten to know some of the characters, and their relationships have been developed a little bit. They could've made the entire movie as ridiculous as the ending and created sort of a new Naked Gun, but while the Naked Gun movies are hilarious in their own right, I don't think it would've worked as well in this case. The fact that the premise of the movie is initially more or less plausible makes the shenanigans at the end that much funnier. The entire movie builds to the end, and it delivers in every way. Hot Fuzz is a smart, well-written comedy that's probably going to become a cult classic alongside it's predecessor Shaun of the Dead.

The Weather Man (**1/2)

This is a movie starring Nicolas Cage as a David Spritz, a downtrodden, recently divorced, middle-aged man working as a TV weather man in Chicago. Some parts of the movie are written better than others. There's a few memorable lines and Nicolas Cage's narration in particular is great, but there are a few scenes where conversations seem kind of forced and awkward. Probably the strongest point of the movie is a great performance by Michael Caine as David's father.

Attack the Gas Station! (**1/2)

Uh... yeah, I wasn't really sure what to make of this. This is a Korean film from 1999 about a group of teenagers who, quite literally, attack a gas station. They rob it and hold people hostage, but more as a sign of rebellion against society than for any sort of monetary gain. There are a few flashbacks explaining how each of them were somehow wronged by a parent or an authority figure, or somehow had their dreams crushed. But really, beyond this, the movie basically just documents what happens as these four people try and torment the legitimate employees (and gang members who inexplicable show up) while trying to maintain the illusion that they're actually running the gas station themselves. Some of this is pretty amusing and it's an enjoyable watch, I'm just not sure if the broader stuff about the troubled past of each of the characters really adds up to anything except a flimsy pretext for why they're attacking a gas station.