Hot Pursuit

Reese Witherspoon is someone to be commended. Sick of the roles she was being offered she started Type A productions with Debra Siegal in order to develop films with strong and interesting female roles. The very ones that are under represented in today’s Hollywood. The first major release by the company was the excellent Wild which also starred Witherspoon. With so much going for her it came as a surprise that she had decided to take the lead role and a production credit on the car wreck of a film called Hot Pursuit.

Cooper (Reese Witherspoon) always wanted to become a cop. Her father was a patrol officer and as she grew she gravitated towards the force. Unfortunately as an officer she has been put to work in the evidence lock up after an unfortunate incident with a member of the public. She has a chance to redeem herself when she is picked to help escort former drug dealer Riva and his wife Daniella (Sofia Vergara) to testify against the Columbian mob. When her partner and the drug dealer are killed, Cooper flees with Daniella. She just has to try to keep her alive while being pursued by dirty cops and Columbian thugs.
The film is something of a mess. The lead actors are both talented but in this they struggle with the wooden and cliched dialogue. They are much better than this. The characters are under developed and you know what they are all about from the start. The character of Cooper is a feminine stereotype that is particularly tired. Lacking in self confidence and using technical Police terms to hide her lack of social skills is something that has been done better elsewhere and isn’t really necessary for this character.

The film is less than ninety minutes long but still overstays its welcome. The main problem is that it isn’t very funny. You can see what they were wanting to do. It just does not work. Jokes and set pieces fail to amuse at all. It is flat and predictable. One scene that says it all is where the two leads pretend to be lesbians to get out of a difficult situation. Really bad. It tells you something when the blooper reel during the end credits is the most humorous part of the whole film.

Overall, a bit of a waste of time and talent. Avoid.

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John McArthur

Editor-in-Chief at Moviescramble. A Fan of all things cinematic with a love of Film Noir, Sci-Fi and Julia Roberts in Notting Hill. He hopes to grow up some day.