James Rocchi At The Movies

'Hot Fuzz,' 'Fracture' Highlight Weekend Fare

CBS 5 Film Critic James Rocchi

(CBS 5) Hot Fuzz
4 Reels out of 4
Hot on the startling cult success of the zombie-romantic-comedy Shaun of the Dead, stars Shaun Pegg and Nick Frost re-team with director Edgar Wright for another genre-comedy flick -- but this time, the trio has action-cop movies dead in their sights. London cop Nicholas Angel (Pegg) is so extraordinary that he's making every other cop in town look bad -- and he's exiled to the sleepy hamlet of Sandford as his 'reward.' Once there, Angel's teamed with the dim-but-kind Constable Butterman (Frost) and grates at the sleepy tone of Sandford life -- until he realizes that Sandford's small-town charm masks a mysteriously high number of 'accidental' deaths. … Shaun of the Dead, to me, undermined itself -- it's hard to be scared when you're laughing, and vice-versa. But Hot Fuzz's mockery of action-cop flick cliché's isn't just funny; it's also well-shot, well-cut, and perfectly-timed. Pegg is a comedy powerhouse with a slow-burn deadpan, and Frost the perfect foil; the sprawling cast of big-name British actors in genial cameos doesn't hurt, either. Hot Fuzz is pretty much the perfect action-comedy: fast enough to accelerate your pulse rate, and funny enough to have you laughing throughout.


Fracture
3 Reels out of 4
I was predisposed to not like this legal thriller, which pits cool, cerebral killer Anthony Hopkins against nervy, bold prosecutor Ryan Gosling, if only because Hopkins's performances have become so lazy since his Oscar win for Silence of the Lambs that he's become an unwelcome presence on-screen. Fortunately, that works to Fracture's advantage -- you're not supposed to like Hopkins, as he's planned the perfect murder and it looks like he's going to get off. Gosling -- Oscar-nominated for last year's Half Nelson -- manages to more than hold his own opposite Hopkins, and there's a crackerjack supporting cast and more than a few nicely-tuned lines of black comedy to heighten the tension. In the end, I was actually surprised by how much I enjoyed Fracture -- the to-and-fro of Hopkin's scenes with Gosling, and the urban, urbane cynicism of the script. Fracture isn't perfect -- I had to sit and map out the plot's final twist with pen-and-paper afterwards, a trifle confused by how the endgame was depicted on-screen -- but it's a nice change of pace for Hopkins, and a pleasure to see Gosling move up in the world as an actor and movie star.

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