Watched on 4K UHD Blu-Ray

My repeat viewing of "Shaun of the Dead" as part of my Schocktober this year now lies a few days back and so it was time to devote myself once again to the Cornetto trilogy and now also subject one of my all-time favourite comedies "Hot Fuzz" to another viewing, whereby I will leave the rarely stupid German subtitle unmentioned, which many years ago, almost caused me to give the film a wide berth, which would have been a real shame considering the insane sovereignty with which an all-round convincing action film and an uproariously funny comedy have been staged here, because especially in the direct comparison of the first and second outgrowths of the alternatively titled "Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy", I can't help but find this excursion into the police film business even a touch more convincing and coherent than the zombie stuff. In terms of production, the first part has lost none of its charm (if one can really speak of parts in the case of such fundamentally different films), but the editing montages are even sleeker here, the gags are even better, the pace in general feels quite high, and this despite the fact that the main character Nicholas Angel - the archetype of an uber-cop - finds himself in a truly tranquil little town.

The opening sequence alone has it all, when Angel and superiors get into hectic verbal exchanges and new, higher-ups are always called in, while the guest appearances by Martin Freeman and Bill Nighy are already an early cherry on the cake at this point. Normally, by the way, I'm not even a big fan of big-city-man-in-a-small-city stories, which often have something of a cheap take on the fish-out-of-water subject, but here things work out noticeably. Meanwhile, thanks to the quirky village community, which is naturally suspicious of the big-city cop, there is plenty of room in "Hot Fuzz" for quirky as well as eccentric characters, who really bring Sandford to life in all its strangeness and from whose sheer mass not only, but especially Timothy Dalton as obscure supermarket owner Simon Skinner and Jim Broadbent as police chief and, as it were, Danny's father, noticeably stand out. And anyone who thinks that a small town is no good for a big confrontation can look forward to the last half hour, which not only sets off an unparalleled action firework display without forgetting the comedic interludes and winking cross-references, but also easily outshines the majority of generic action films without this clever superstructure.

What I already praised in "Shaun of the Dead" also applies here, namely that Wright's second Cornetto film wants to be understood as a parody, but does not make fun of the genre itself but only of its set pieces and clichés, while the film itself is also a worthy representative of the genre and is only further refined by the intelligent jokes, tips and verbalisations. The resolution of the large-scale conspiracy in rural Sandford is just as well-done and hilarious as the rest of the film, and even knowing this trick, the investigations of Angel and his new partner Danny Butterman are a lot of fun, especially since Nick Frost once again gets to prove his talent as a best buddy at Simon Pegg's side, while Pegg himself really gets to play the cool bastard for once and doesn't have to make any compromises, since he is usually known as a lovable loser.

Despite, or perhaps because of, the pleasantly high action content of the story, the first half is comparatively tranquil, but no one should be irritated by this calm before the storm, especially since the typical small-town problems, such as the search for a runaway swan, have entertainment potential and will even have relevance for the rest of the story, which once again speaks for the quality of the script, which once again director Edgar Wright and lead actor Simon Pegg worked on together and in which every detail, no matter how small, is an indispensable piece of the mosaic of the whole, especially since, far from the countless quotations and reminiscences, the parallels to the other films of the "Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy" are unmistakable. For example, the amount of splatter is carefully increased when the actual story about a mysterious series of murders really gets going, which of course is also a homage to the genre, but also strengthens the connection to the predecessor, which of course has long been given by the Cornetto ice cream consumed here, this time - how could it be otherwise - in the blue classic version.