Hot Fuzz | What to Watch

A hilarious crime spoof. 4/5 stars

Simon Pegg (who also co-wrote the script with director Edgar Wright) plays an over-zealous London cop, who's demoted and dumped in a quiet rural village.

But he soon needs all his big-city wits about him when he's up to his neck in corpses, while Nick Frost is his new colleague and shifty locals Timothy Dalton, Jim Broadbent and Edward Woodward arise his suspicions.

This hilarious spoof thriller – the second collaboration between Pegg and Wright following 2004's Shaun of the Dead – delivers its gags at machine-gun rate and also hits the bull's-eye with its exciting and violent action set pieces that have the impact of a real thriller.

A film critic for over 25 years, Jason admits the job can occasionally be glamorous – sitting on a film festival jury in Portugal; hanging out with Baz Luhrmann at the Chateau Marmont; chatting with Sigourney Weaver about The Archers – but he mostly spends his time in darkened rooms watching films. He’s also written theatre and opera reviews, two guide books on Rome, and competed in a race for Yachting World, whose great wheeze it was to send a seasick film critic to write about his time on the ocean waves. But Jason is happiest on dry land with a classic screwball comedy or Hitchcock thriller.