Hot Fuzz

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

The good humor bubbles up from a deep reservoir of affection for Hollywood schlock.

Time Richard Corliss

The best, surely the smartest, English-language movie of the year to date.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

It's not hard to imagine these characters in a straight-faced Hollywood blockbuster. And that's the source of Hot Fuzz's genius, pointing out the thin line that separates convention from farce when Hollywood starts throwing its special effects around.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Everything an action-comedy should be. It achieves through parody what most films in the genre can't accomplish straight.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

In addition to the marvelous lead cast, all sorts of funny performers show up in cameo roles, including Steve Coogan, Bill Nighy, and Timothy Dalton.

LA Weekly Scott Foundas

For most of its running time, it's an enjoyably unpretentious celebration of the guilty pleasure we can take from a stupid-as-all-get-out car chase or from watching things blow up real good. Then, in its final half hour, Wright and Pegg ratchet up the absurdity tenfold and enter the realm of the sublime.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust

Wright and Pegg are storytellers who weave their naughty bits into genuine characters and a plot. It's a ridiculous plot, but one that's absolutely in the spirit of the films they're satirizing.

Newsweek David Ansen

Summer hasn't arrived, but the funniest riff on a summer movie genre has already landed.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

It's as laceratingly entertaining as its predecessor.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Pegg and Wright are armed with an endlessly impressive arsenal of attention grabbers, from witty editing tricks to a wry soundtrack and a joke-packed script that demands multiple viewings.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

If you see Hot Fuzz, you'll never again watch a Michael Bay film without howling with disrespectful laughter.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

In the very funny cop comedy Hot Fuzz, overachieving London police officer Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) commits a very British sin: He's too good.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

Hot Fuzz is something all too rare in movie comedies: a story rather than a string of disjointed skits, with hearty characters behind its caricatures.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

It's smashing fun, nonetheless, made with razor wit and continual invention and far, far fresher than not only Hollywood buddy-cop movies but also Hollywood's own spoofs of them.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

At once deeply affectionate and sharply observed: There's never anything smart-alecky about Wright's approach as a director.

Slate Dana Stevens

Really, do we need another dumb action movie to remind us how dumb action movies are?...Yes. We absolutely do.

Empire Olly Richards

The boys (now in blue) have done it again.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

The whole enterprise goes far beyond pastiche, wreathing its characters in a film-intoxicated world.

Variety Derek Elley

A sustained genre parody that's equally funny but (maybe in deference to the genre) much more pumped up.

Village Voice Robert Wilonsky

A British variation on Hollywood nonsense, and as such it's a little gloomier, a little coarser, and a lot more cerebral--oh, and funnier than all the "Reno 911!" boxed sets combined.

Film Threat Felix Vasquez, Jr.

The thrill of Hot Fuzz is the chemistry between Nicholas and local oaf Danny Butterman, who is an action film aficionado and finds Nicholas' stories utterly engrossing.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

Since Mr. Wright and Mr. Pegg are essentially parodying self-parodies, they have also smartly kinked up their conceit by setting most of the film in a sleepy village that might as well be called Ye Old English Towne, thereby wedding one of the most irritating British exports to one of the most absurd American ones. Think of it as "The Full Monty" blown to smithereens.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

The most originally funny movie to hit U.S. screens in a while.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

Deeply nuts and exhaustingly hilarious.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

A little too long and suffers from a sagging midsection when the level of exposition becomes laborious, but the spectacularly entertaining final 30 minutes compensates for a lot of flaws.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

It's a blast.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The best of it is a riot--a "Bad Boys II" fireball hurled with exquisite accuracy at a quaint English town peopled by Agatha Christie archetypes.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

It's bloody carnage - or it's ketchup, or bolognese sauce, at the very least.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

It's to the "Lethal Weapon" movies what left-hand driving on a country lane is to a freeway chase: pokey, more than a little daft, but with a bloody surprise around every hedge.

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub

Plays like two films in one, and succeeds on both levels.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

With Hot Fuzz, you'll just have to settle for semi-hilarity.

New York Post Kyle Smith

A real actioner, generous with the bullets and blood and chase scenes, that simultaneously mocks shoot-'em-ups.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Hot Fuzz deploys the same mix of genre conventions, slapstick and old-school British humor that made "Shaun of the Dead" such a dumb-but-good romp.

New York Magazine David Edelstein

Hot Fuzz is fun, and it's nice to see all the English character actors who aren't busy in Harry Potter films, but it lacks its predecessor's freshness.

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

Basically a one-joke movie, and they take their sweet time -- too much of it, actually -- getting to the good stuff. But what excellent laughs they provide in the end.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Though it's no "Monty Python," Hot Fuzz is a clever, over-the-top marriage of mayhem and merriment.

The Hollywood Reporter Ray Bennett

All the action is staged with energy, but it gets relentless without anything really funny going on.