'Hot Pursuit'

In cinemas July 31st!

Fresh off the back of an appearance in the Academy Award–nominated 'Inherent Vice', as well as an equally lauded performance in 'Wild', Reese Witherspoon returns to more comedic stomping grounds for the first time since competent if somewhat generic 2012 rom-action-com, 'This Means War'. Unfortunately, the result does little to hit the same heights as her recent dramatic and much earlier comedic turns, as well as the standard elevated by other, similarly-spirited endeavours.

An uptight and by-the-book cop tries to protect the outgoing widow of a drug boss as they race through Texas pursued by crooked cops and murderous gunmen.

Kicking off with an original and actually quite inspired opening, which details the life and motivations of Officer Cooper (Witherspoon), it’s a shame to witness the film slip backwards and rely heavily on outdated clichés and tropes. Writers David Feeney and John Quaintance throw everything at the wall in the name of humour; missing only the kitchen sink, substituted instead for diamond-encrusted shoes. Sadly, very little successfully sticks, with only a running joke regarding Officer Cooper’s height and the age of Daniella Riva (Vergara), as well as Officer Cooper’s climactic choice of disguise, serving to provoke more than chuckles.

Reese Witherspoon gives it her all, throwing herself as unabashedly headlong into role as her character does her assignments, thus imbuing the technically intelligent but frustratingly inept officer with not only a pitch perfect accent but a degree of quirky, endearingly oblivious charm. However, even her considerable abilities are not enough to carry the weight of the writing she has been burdened with. A fact that is exponentially more evident in the scenes she shares with Sofia Vergara, who, is lumbered with a character so stereotypical and over-the-top, there is no room for her to do anything but play broadly into it. She also is extremely game, but the lack of subtlety serves mostly to grate rather than amuse. 

The obvious chemistry apparent in the traditional amid-credit outtakes fails to transfer to the preceding story, with the casual off-screen banter easily eclipsing the scripted humour. The  more dramatic elements and humanising back-story suffer a similar fate, shoe-horned into the reduced run-time in a vain attempt to generate pathos, empathy, and a sense of sisterhood. At no point amid the bickering, betrayals, and out-right cat-fights, does it ever feel believable that a genuine friendship would form, much less that they would rush head-first into danger for the other. Some late-in-the-game twists ably raise the stakes, but feel similarly incongruous and fail to connect with anything that came before, doing nothing to truly deepen the bond.

The mismatched pairing of opposites is nothing new to the world of cinema, and this has nothing new to offer, borrowing unashamedly from the likes of 'Speed' right through to Adam Sandler’s 'Bulletproof'. Director Anne Fletcher sets things in motion early and maintains a consistently rapid pace, navigating some impressive action sequences along the way, but following in the wake of such films as 'Spy', 'Hot Pursuit' not only fails to emulate but actually feels like more than a few step in the opposite direction.

Review by Jay Thomas.

Tell us what you think!
Rate the film and why not write your own review in the comments?