Movie Review: Hot Pursuit

Hot Pursuit is a crime/comedy starring two actresses who are not only extremely different but have both shown that they can act and be funny in some way. So, putting them together would be a great idea because you would get to see how these contrasting personalities play off each other to create some great comedy right? Well, no. In theory it sounds like a great idea but the final result turned out to be a completely unfunny and at times downright boring film. The writing was just bad and the performances were absolutely unbearable at times, from Reese Witherspoon’s irritating accent to Sofia Vergara’s annoying vooooiiice that always speaks like thiiiiiiiiiis, this movie could not be over quick enough. And thankfully it was only 1 hour and 20 minutes, any more and i may have just given up. I have nothing against the actresses, in fact i really enjoy both of their stuff, whether it be Witherspoon in last year’s ‘Wild’ or Vergara in ‘Modern Family’ i have seen they can put out good performances. But in this film they were just so awful that it leads me to believe that they actually acted the way that they were supposed to and it was the directors fault, either way, their chemistry was non existent and the back and forth jokes you thought you might see were either not their or not funny.

Speaking of the jokes, who wrote these? Every single joke fell flat and made me sigh as oppose to laugh, and 80% of the jokes i saw coming from a mile away. I am not sure what goes through peoples minds when they write a comedy but do they test out jokes before they crap them out onto a piece of paper? Because they definitely didn’t do that here. There was one joke that they ran with for the entire film and i liked it, it made me chuckle a little, but that was the best it got. Two comedy stars with no comedy in sight, such a waste.

In terms of the plot…… UGH, i don’t even want to talk about it. They use very dumb explanations and twists throughout the film that are literally only there to keep your female leads moving from location to location. But in between ‘comedy’ moments they try and put little hints to some larger conspiracy going on that goes right over your head for 90% of the film because you are so bored and don’t really know what is going on. And then the film does what many crime comedy films tend to try (except this fails at it), which is to take a very sudden turn and ditch the jokes for a full on crime film finale and it just felt ridiculously forced and rushed. It assumes you have been following all of the little hints and then tries to pull the rug out from under you and surprise you but it doesn’t work like most aspects of this film. In the end, this was rushed, boring, unfunny, and a film i would rather forget about. The only thing it had going for it is one running joke and getting to see Sofia Vergara in her underwear for one scene, other than that it’s a waste of time. – 1.6/10