Edgar Wright: 10 Moments That Prove His Utter Genius

2. Final 30 Minutes Of Hot Fuzz

I talked of the tone and payoffs earlier in this list and this may be a bit of a cheat here, considering the final 30 minutes of a film as a moment but that's what I'm about to do. We can be adults about this because if we're honest with ourselves we can admit that this entire list could be comprised of moments from the 30 minutes we're about to discuss. This finale was (and still is) legendary. Have you ever seen the finale of a movie reward the time you've spent watching like this movie did? (you didn't, trust me) Every pop culture reference made ended up getting screen time. We saw the Neighborhood Watch outed as a cult and Nick driven out of town by Danny. Then, Nick saw copies of Bad Boys 2 and Point Break at a gas station and one purchase of cheap sunglasses later, it was about. To. Go. Down. What followed, could be called ridiculous. It could be called a gleeful embrace of movie violence. It could be called F@#!ing awesome. It all applies because what Wright does is give us an explosion of action so nuts we don't know how to stop smiling. He wears all his action movie influences on his sleeve and gives them the business. The town center shoot out? Wild Bunch. Slow-mo gunplay and our hero surrounded by birds? John Woo. We even got treated to an homage to Godzilla as Nick and Skinner battled it out through a tiny, model village. There's almost too many homages to mention here. Actually, there are too many so suffice it to say, Hot Fuzz outdid the action movies it was attempting to pay tribute to. That is no easy feat but Wright made it look like a piece of cake (just like the one's available at the police station). So, if you haven't seen Hot Fuzz, there's two things I have to say to you: Fascist. Hag. You're an idiot.