Writer-director Edgar Wright re-teams with co-writer/star Simon Pegg and co-star Nick Frost in their follow up to SHAUN OF THE DEAD, the new British import cop comedy HOT FUZZ.   It certainly is a tough act to follow, but the trio do a bang-up job swapping brain-hungry zombies for conspiratorial murders in the quiet countryside of England.   While the results are just as fond an homage to the Jerry Bruckheimer school of action films as their first film was a loving tribute to George Romero's LIVING DEAD canon, HOT FUZZ isn't as long on laughs nor as cleverly original a spin on the subject matter the second time around.

One welcome twist away from their previously successful formula has Simon Pegg trading in his underdog hero role for a straighter, stronger leading man as Sgt. Nicholas Angel, the best cop in the London Metro force.  Angel's arrest rate is 400% higher than the rest of his division, thus he's deemed by Chief Inspector Kenneth (Bill Nighy in a small, underutilized role) a threat to service morale and transferred to the sleepy town of Sandford, voted the best and village in England for years running.

Understandably disappointed that his sharp eye and keen detective brain are punished instead of rewarded, Angel packs up his pathetically single belongings and packs off for a long train journey away from the city, and practically back in time to arrive in bucolic, boringly safe Sandford.   The anticipated fish-out-of-water shock of this crime-void culture ensues, as Angel encounters the contented, cake-eating team of Sandford's finest, led by police chief Frank Butterman (Jim Broadbent). 

Angel's ravenous drive to be the best, most dynamic police officer in any environment has him butting heads with the town's two mustachioed detectives (Paddy Considine and Rafe Spall) who tease him mercilessly for his pushy city edge. The Chief's son Danny Butterman (Nick Frost) is the lone officer who is impressed with Angel's professional acumen, but only in terms of how Angel lives the cop life which Danny idolizes from those high-concept cop flicks like POINT BREAK and Bruckheimer's BAD BOYS II.  The entire Sandford force has been so lulled into complacency by the non-existent crime rate that, in Angel's view, they've forgotten how to be police officers and he's there to set an example, for the force and the townspeople who have been lulled to sleep by their idyllic country lifestyle.

As you might guess, such somnambulism harkens back both thematically and deliberately to SHAUN OF THE DEAD, but in much more subtle and less effective ways in this film.  If there's a minor but consistent flaw in HOT FUZZ, it's that the film is too self-relexive, too aware of the genre homages it makes while it makes them, quite unlike Wright and Pegg's preceding work.   When Danny Butterman pays tribute to his favorite American action films, their payoffs in the story are merely replications rather than ironic twists on the source scene.  Angel and Butterman are too aware they're attempting to replicate blockbuster cop action instead of enacting a wild, irreverent but loving send-up of the films they clearly enjoy and admire.

Granted it's tough for any filmmaker to out-Bruckheimer Bruckheimer, but Edgar Wright and his production team take a good shot at such action, Britain-style.   Americans may have trouble appreciating the cultural contrast presented to English audiences by such gun-happy flicks where the Metro police force walks its beat unarmed, and conversely we might miss how outrageously, enjoyably over-the-top our exported action-and-ammo obsessed films seem them. 

Aye, here's the rub as the plot forces officers Angel and Butterman to unleash their bravado and become the bloodied shoot-em-up Bruckheimer cops we're used to seeing in action from the opening credits.  Thus the intent of the rather low-profile opening thirty minutes may be underappreciated by U.S. audiences — though for its own good sake, Wright could have edited 20 minutes off the film's two hour running time and yielded a tighter, more effective story.  If anything, a Bruckheimer production's trademark is its breakneck pacing and relentless action to advance the plot — so if it was Wright and Pegg's intent to pay tribute to or parodize such slam-bang cinema candy, they should have copied the genre's high-octane pacing as well.

With with SHAUN OF THE DEAD, the strengths of HOT FUZZ arise from the characterizations rather than the plot, which tends to bog down Angel, Butterman and the comedy when it gets a bit too literal and rigid for its own good.  Simon Pegg proves he can play the British flipside of an American hardass cop, though his work as Shaun the zombie killer was more appealing and sympathetic.  Nick Frost's Danny Butterman is as soft and his name implies until Angel trains him to release his inner crimebuster, and thus Frost dials back his performance in quite a contrast to Shaun's slacker pal Ed.  The acting duo remains as charming and funny on-screen as before, even if this script is thinner on the hilarious doses of originality injected into their characters.

Timothy Dalton makes the most of his supporting role as Simon Skinner, a local market owner whose suave and shadowy manner puts him immediately at the top of the suspect list once the body count begins, albeit much to Angel's chagrin as the plot twists.  Dalton has aged well with a distinguished Britannic flair which suits the role perfectly, yet the actor undercuts his own character with very subtle hints of playfulness which repeatedly add dark glee to the film.   Hopefully HOT FUZZ will get Dalton much more work as he leaves his Bond years behind and matures into a delightful character actor in the best sense of the word.

Initially I feared Jim Broadbent might be as equally and woefully underused as was Bill Nighy, but Broadbent's police chief remains active throughout the story as Danny's father and leading peace officer in Sandford.  Nighy's success and long-term commitment to the PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN films must have made his appearance in HOT FUZZ a welcome but brief cameo stint, as is Martin Freeman's appearance as Angel's Sergeant in the London Met.   Fans of the Britcom import GREEN WING may recognize Olivia Colman as constable Doris Thatcher, who brings enjoyable verve to an otherwise one-note supporting part on the page.

Rounding out the Sandford townsfolk are a populous of veteran actors including Paul Freeman (RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK), David Threlfall (MASTER AND COMMANDER), Edward Woodward (THE EQUALIZER) and Stephen Merchant (EXTRAS), all of whom bring appropriate comedic gusto to their small but interconnected roles as the backbone — however crooked — of this perfect community.

The pop tune soundtrack entries aren't as delightfully funky or comically counterpoint to HOT FUZZ as that heard and enjoyed in SHAUN OF THE DEAD, but still suit the film well enough.  High scores to cinematographer Jess Hall and editor Chris Dickens for evoking the camera acrobatics from American action epics so humorously and effectively at the same time.   Hall and director Wright have a great deal of fun slamming in for intense action-hero closeups as the genre dictates, but landing on Simon Pegg's thin face and peach fuzz hair to inspire many laughs.

In the end, HOT FUZZ may not get a fair shake due to inevitable comparisons to SHAUN OF THE DEAD, which is a tad unfair since this new film earns much by its own merits.  On the other hand, creators Wright and Pegg also dip too much into their own well, calling back moments and punchlines from SHAUN which seem forced and formulaic now in their new film.  SHAUN OF THE DEAD's ultimate success and charm arose from two hapless characters who didn't know they'd fallen into a Romero-esque zombie film, and fought their way out of it through a series of gory comic misadventures while staying true to the movie which schooled them.  Alas, moments of HOT FUZZ are simply too self-consciously adoring of Yankee action blockbusters to get out of its own homage gear and set itself free to take the genre to a higher comedic level.  At moments it's too much or not enough of a good thing, but still Edgar Wright's HOT FUZZ serves and protects his film reputation with a nearly endless clip of rapid-fire gags and laughs.