MEANING:
In a interview with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, they both claimed that they wanted to create a title that has "very little meaning". They've wanted to the appeal to the two word titles of the 80s and 90s action flicks such as Lethal Weapon and Point Break to make it sound like an action film. (http://movies.about.com/od/hotfuzz/a/hotfuzzsp041307.htm)
In my opinion, I think this film is displaying the meaning of humour and the differences between American police shows and British police shows, which is displayed in the two main characters, Nicholas and Danny. I also think that it's about friendship as Nicholas, who once was so tense and serious, begins to loosen up near the end of the film as he sticks around his partner, Danny.
"The dualist approach looks for pairs of opposites (male-female, good-evil, light-dark, urban-rural, etc.), possibly identifying them as symbolic of contrasting tendencies in society or human nature itself." -- Christopher P. Jacobs.
The reason why I have chosen this quote because we can actually see this in the film. Both Nicholas and Danny are the complete opposites in terms of personality -- Nicholas is the serious type, and he makes sure that people goes by the law. Danny, on the other hand, is carefree and is very excited about action movies. From here, we can see the contrast between the two characters.
HOT FUZZ
YEAR:
2007
PG RATING:
R-rated (18+) (USA)
R15 (UK)
GENRE(S):
Action | Comedy | Black Comedy | Adventure | Parody | Crime | Drama | Mystery
Release dates:
14 February 2007 (United Kingdom)
20 April 2007 (United States)
18 July 2007 (France)
DIRECTOR: Edgar Wright
WRITER(S): Egdar Wright Simon Pegg
STARRING: Simon Pegg & Nick Frost
SYNOPSIS:
ACT 1
Nicholas Angel, who is a top London cop, has been moved to a quaint English village of Sandford, Gloucestershire to stop him from making the rest of the team look bad. He is paired with a partner, Danny Butterman, who questions on the action lifestyle of being a policeman. As they monitor the town, Nicholas suspects a dark mystery within the residents as the mysterious deaths appears in various parts of the village.
ACT 2
Upon hearing this, the Sergeant is forced to flee, but he becomes trapped in a crypt where he discovers the bodies of the NWA's ill-fated victims. It seems that Angel is about to be caught, when Danny suddenly appears and stabs him, causing the Sergeant to lose consciousness. He awakens in Danny's car, where the younger Butterman reveals he only faked Angel's murder to cover his escape. Danny begs his partner to leave Sandford for his own safety.More deaths has been written off as "accidents" and Nicholas is determined to find out who is the one causing the mysterious deaths of the civilians. When he goes to a meeting of the Sandford NWA, he finds out that the group are carrying out the murders on the residents who prevent Sandford from being crowned Village of the Year, with Inspector Butterman being the leader of the group to avenge his late wife Irene after her plan to win that title has been foiled by "gyspies" and committed suicide.
ACT 3
Some time later, Angel superiors from the London department beg him to come back as the city's crime rate has risen heavily, but Angel declines and chooses to remain in Sandford. As he and the other police officers process paperwork related to their recent activities, Tom Weaver, the last NWA member, bursts into the station and attempts to kill Sgt. Angel. As the officers attempt to disarm him, he stumbles into the confiscated sea mine and triggers it. Angel and the others manage to survive the ensuing explosion which destroys the station. One year later, Angel and Danny are in charge of the Sandford Police as Inspector and Sergeant, respectively.
DURATION: 121 minutes (2h 1m)
CONTENT:
This is about a former London constable, Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) who finds himself being unable to adapt to his new assignment in the sleepy British village of Sandford. Not only does he miss the excitement of the big city, but he also has a well-meaning oaf (Nick Frost) for a partner. However, when a series of grisly accidents rocks Sandford, Nick smells something rotten in the idyllic village.
This is a rated R (USA)/R15 (UK) film with a duration of 121 minutes.
It contains explicit content due to strong bloody violence in the film.
"A slightly deeper level of interpretation is implicit content, which may be less obvious but can still be inferred by seeing how the characters change, grow, and develop throughout the course of the film." -- Christopher P. Jacobs.
The reason why I've chosen this quote is because that there have been character developments, although they are subtle. For example, Nicholas Angel hardly smiles in the film, as he is supposed to be a very serious character, however after having moments together with Danny Butterman and solving the mysteries as the film progresses, near the end of the film, you can see him actually smiling (Simon Pegg said in a commentary that he doesn't smile "until 45 minutes into the film"), now becoming a relaxed character.
His clothes also show changes, from being neat and tidy to being loosened up and messy with a few open buttons. This prove that, while it does have explicit content, it also shows implicit content through character development and unexpected plot twists.
KEY SCENES
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MAIN CAST:
Simon Pegg as Nicholas "Nick" Angel
Olivia Colman as PC Doris Thatcher
Bill Bailey as Desk Sgt Turner
Edward Woodward as Tom Weaver
Nick Frost as PC Danny Butterman
Kevin Eldon as Sgt Tony Fisher
Paddy Considine as DS Andy Wainwright
Rafe Spall as DC Andy Cartwright
Sampson as Saxon
Jim Broadbent as Inspector Frank Butterman
Karl Johnson as PC Bob Walker
Martin Freeman as Met Sergeant
Bill Nighy as Met Chief Sergeant
Nick Frost as PC Danny Butterman
Stuart Wilson as Dr. Robin Hatcher
PURPOSE:
The word “fuzz” is a British derogatory slang term for police. “Hot” could mean action-packed, which matches the genre of the film and what it is going to show to the audience. During in one of the interview, Edgar has said that Hot Fuzz came from an inspiration from watching late 80s buddy films as a teenager (for example, Die Hard). He was “interested in cops than gangsters”. Simon Pegg has also mentioned another inspiration from a movie named Dead Heat, which was a horror, zombie film, also a buddy movie film.
Another theory proves that Hot Fuzz is just parodying American police shows “in a ridiculously high-charged, high adrenaline overblown way” and British police shows that are “always about a quiet, cerebral, upper-class detective”, which made sense as it may be the reason why there is such a contrast between Nicholas and Danny.
(http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/41432/why-is-the-movie-named-hot-fuzz)
GENRES:
Hot Fuzz is a hybrid consisting many genres; action, (black) comedy, parody, crime drama, buddy movie and mystery. This fits and challenges conventions, as there are things that can be found in the film. Edgar Wright may have done this to be able to create a unique movie, one that the audience has never seen before, using his inspirations and interests.
‘Buddy movie’ was expected in the film, and proved it from the movie poster of showing a two-shot of two policemen being crime partners, which can lead them to think that it would be a typical convention of a buddy film. It has shown scenes of where it is related to the genre, although as it is a hybrid, it was expected to have unexpected scenes and a mixture of genre, such as horror and gore added into the film. This creates a dark humour in comedy—which can be known as ‘black comedy’—putting light onto a serious situation.
On Kotaku, Kirk Hamilton has mentioned that not only is it just a buddy-cop movie, it’s a “proper Agatha Christie-style mystery”. (http://kotaku.com/hot-fuzz-is-a-god-damned-masterpiece-1699788041)
This scene proves that this has a genre of crime as well as a mixture of horror and gore due to the knife going through Nicholas' hand. It appears to be a bit extreme and understandable that it has to be rated R/R15.
Despite being on an investigation, it brings out humour in the film as the two policemen perform an obvious running gag by chasing a swan. It's what they say, "a wild goose (or swan) chase".
FORM:
The movie has duration of 121 minutes (2 hours and 1 minute) and it is set in a small village located in Gloucestershire, England. It is a non-animated (real-life), action comedy film made in 2007. It is a rated R film (R-15 in UK), which means that it is possible that there will be gore, violence, and strong profanity in some of the scenes of the movie. Any children between the age of 13-16 and are under the age of 18 will have to be supervised by a parent/an adult if they want to watch this film.
There have been uses of strong language and two uses of strong languages that may be converted into humour and not in an offensive manner. In this theory, they have proved it by saying this: “The film exploits the presentation of bad language in one scene, where hero cop Nick Angel snarls, ‘You mothers...!’ at a group of (literal) mums who come down the lane with their children, making a joke about a familiar swear word, without using the word itself.” (http://www.bbfc.co.uk/case-studies/hot-fuzz)
PRODUCTION
PROCESS:
pre-production:
Edgar Wright started creating Hot Fuzz alongside with actor Simon Pegg and hired the cast needed for the film from 2006. They hadn’t started on this when it got leaked and they were pressurized by their fans who questioned them on what’s going to be about.
In an interview, Nick Frost and Simon Pegg were very excited to see some familiar actors such as Jim Broadbent. They’ve jokingly said, “No” to him when he asked if they would consider working with him in one of their future projects (which was Hot Fuzz), but shortly after, they immediately went away to create the character Frank Butterman for Jim. (http://movies.about.com/od/hotfuzz/a/hotfuzzsp041307_2.htm)
A buddy movie obviously should have two people being "partners in crime" (well, literally in this case) as the scene shows Nicholas Angel and Danny Butterman eating ice cream together while they're on duty.
STYLE:
In Hot Fuzz, there have been many styles used in the film, such as music, camera frames, editing and et cetera. There have been uses of clothing, makeup and characters. They've even put in cameos in the film. For example, costumes: Nicholas Angel is a police officer, so his costume is suited to look like a police officer. His character is very serious and tense, and appears to be very organised so his costume is neat and clean. He is unlike PC Danny, who is a comical character so because of that, there is a contrast between the two characters.
However for the flashes and cuts, Edgar Wright has mentioned that the flashback sequences between Nicholas and Skinner was not fully scripted. Wright has said that they’ve seen lots of flash cuts and flashbacks and thought that it “looks pretty cool for a British film”. (http://filmschoolrejects.com/features/29-things-we-learned-from-the-hot-fuzz-commentary.php)
production:
The production ran from March until July 2006, and they’ve used green screen when it came to the gory scenes, such as the part of the church falling and crushing a man’s head or having a spire coming out from the chin. It was a way where they can fully put in the emotion of the violence that is displayed in the film and wanted to show the action that came along with that violence.
It has been filmed in six different locations of the UK. The production took place in London, England before they moved towards Somerset, Hertfordshire, and Hendon.
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Wells, Somerset, England, UK
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(Sandford)
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The Crown Pub, Wells, Somerset, England, UK
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(The Crown pub)
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Barn Theatre, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, England, UK
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(interiors)
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Hendon Police Training College, Aerodrome Road, Hendon, London, England, UK
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Bishop's Palace, Wells, Somerset, England, UK
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(Sandford Castle)
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London, England, UK
(http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0425112/locations?ref_=ttco_ql_6 – accessed 03/10/2015)
post-production:
Hot Fuzz went through a digital intermediate process such as film scanning DI after the footage was completed and edited. Soundtracks were created to sound like a super-hero film before the sound editors changed it to manipulate the audience’s emotion during the scene.
Chris Dickens, one of the editors for Hot Fuzz, has said this in an interview: “When you work with sound, you have to think about what works for the picture and how to manipulate the audience’s emotions. I love to intertwine music and sound effects to create a ‘soup’ that is very atmospheric – so you can’t tell the difference between the music and the effects.” (https://digitalfilms.wordpress.com/2007/06/16/interview-with-hot-fuzz-editor-chris-dickens/)