The nerds that brought you the U.K. zombie romp “Shaun of the Dead,” are back with “Hot Fuzz,” which is already a huge sensation in the U.K. Without reading a word about it, one can assume it’s another one of those zany Brit comedies, this time about “Bobbies.” It sort of looks like the British version of “Super Troopers”: ineffectual, overeager, bored local cops have nothing to do, create amusement for themselves and then likely stumble upon something that Scotland Yard or someone should deal with, but this is their big opp to shine! My sarcasm and disdain is sort of exaggerated. “Shaun” was initially annoying (to me), but I’ve come to relax and enjoy it for what it is. I think it’s just that zombie movies generally drive me nuts, because the characters keep doing stupid things that will obviously get them killed and this movie was obviously just a parody of the genre, but maybe I just couldn’t get past that, etc. etc.
Anyhoo, the soundtrack looks fun. It contains tracks from the Kinks (“the Village Green Preservation Society” !!!), T-Rex, XTC, the Troggs, Supergrass, Jon Spencer and Robert Rodriguez?
The connection is that “Shaun” director, Edgar Wright, directed one of the fake “Grindhouse” trailers that separates the two films (“Don’t Scream”). The other two are directed by schlock it-boy of the moment, Eli Roth (“Thanksgiving”), Rob Zombie (“Werewolf Women of the S.S.”) and Rodriguez himself (“Machete”).
OK, that’s enough Grindhouse for one week, but you can see why the fan-boys are totally erect for this film; it’s total nerd-porn.
Back to “Hot Fuzz.” I’m not sure how I feel about this movie, but I may have to see it just to see “The Village Green Preservation Society” used on film. It’s one of my all-time favorite songs (I put it on my first fake movie mixtape cassette, yes, cassette, in 1998) and I’ll have high expectations of how it’s used. It’ll be interesting to see it if plays anyhow. Lord knows one could get major comedy out of that juxtaposition of song and celluloid.
According to the always unreliable IMDB, “Fuzz” opens in the U.S. in limited release on April 22. No word on the soundtrack release date yet. Time Out, has a good overview article on “Hot Fuzz” if you want to explore deeper.
How amazing is this? (Angelo, I KNOW you are gonna love this)
The Kinks – The Village Green Preservation Society [1973]
I wonder if one of those female back-up singers was (Ray’s wife) Rasa Davies.
