‘Hot Pursuit’ is an Unoriginal, Redundant Hot Mess

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CHICAGO – I get it. The old fashioned buddy movie, except with the twist of the femme-flavor-of-the-moment Sofia Vergara and runty Reese Witherspoon. It practically writes itself. In fact, that might be the only legitimate excuse for the mess that is “Hot Pursuit” – it wrote itself.

With a title so lazy it should come with its own hammock, “Hot Pursuit” recycles every plot point and joke stylings from every buddy picture ever made. What could have been an interesting twist – Sofia Vergara has established herself as a funny character on TV’s “Modern Family” – turns into a shriek fest with Vergara doing most of the unfunny shrieking, with a philosophy of “If we say the jokes louder maybe they’ll be funny…” Reese Witherspoon, who is no slouch when it comes to doing comedy (Her Tracy Flick role in “Election” is one of the funniest characters of the past 20 years), seems lost as well, and can’t work her way past the bad script. The old show business saying holds true for this one, “you can screw up a good script a hundred different ways, but you can’t made a bad script better no matter what you do.”

Officer Cooper (Witherspoon) is a by-the-book police force desk jockey, desperately looking for a street case. Her wish is granted when a drug lord begins killing all of the material witnesses against him, and Cooper’s assignment becomes to protect Danielle Riva (Vergara), the wife of one of those witnesses. They are ambushed at Riva’s home, the husband is killed, and now the two mismatched pair must go on the lam.

Sonia Vergara, Reese Witherspoon
Let’s Try Screaming the Jokes! Riva (Sonia Vergara) and Cooper (Reese Witherspoon) in ‘Hot Pursuit’
Photo credit: Warner Bros.

Like every fugitive ever pursued, Riva carries a mysterious rolling suitcase – which leads to a redundant sight gag just watching her pull in over various surfaces in high heels – and dresses in figure hugging clothes. Cooper, in the meantime, while perplexed with her new on-the-run partner, clings to her assignment until the confrontation with the drug lord becomes inevitable.

This is a screenplay written by two men – David Feeney and John Quaintance – and directed by a woman, Anne Fletcher, and it had the kind of clumsy trying-to-be-relevant style that you might expect in such a production team. The women, for example, get out of a jam by panicking some men about menstruation, and get out of another by pretending to be lesbians. Ha-ha. The script is wholly unoriginal, with the type of gags seen over and over in the last 30 years of buddy movies, including a grown woman not know what the term “shotgun” means, when talking about car seating arrangements.

Reese Witherspoon has seen better days of comedy. Her officious cop starts out okay – thinking perhaps Tracy Flick in a uniform – and devolves to the point that when the women need new clothing, and stop at an apparel store truck stop (while Witherspoon’s character is high on cocaine – don’t ask). Let’s see, they’re on the run, so naturally Witherspoon picks a dress with a plunging neckline, as if to say, “you’re not the only one with bosoms, Sofia Vergara!” It’s that kind of film.

Vergara worked hard on her character to distinguish it from Gloria from “Modern Family” – by having straight hair rather than curly. Otherwise, it is the same shrill accent and tenor, and she is embarrassingly forced to use her genetically blessed figure as a come on, rather than the comedic device it is in the TV series. Granted, she isn’t given much of a chance with the bad script, but she needed something else besides eight inch heels to create a persona. She’ll have a short career in films if that’s all she intends to do.

Sonia Vergara, Reese Witherspoon
Quite a Pair: Riva and Cooper Play Dress Up in ‘Hot Pursuit’
Photo credit: Warner Bros.

What is most frustrating is that the potential was there, if they would have just allowed the characters to be truthful. Witherspoon is a great actress, and if she had played it straight down the line, against the uptempo weirdness of Vergara, the film might have played funnier. Instead, she flop sweats through a Justin Bieber costume (I wish I were kidding), and awkwardly tries to convince us that her bureaucratic cop still has sex appeal. It’s that kind of film.

The preview audience was yukking it up, while I sat there watching my life go by, 87 minutes at a time. Which brings up another show business saying – “no matter how short a movie is, if it’s bad it can never be short enough.” “Hot Pursuit” is that kind of film.

“Hot Pursuit” opens everywhere on May 8th. Featuring Sofia Vergara, Reese Witherspoon, Jim Gaffigan, Mike Birbiglia, Richard T. Jones and Matthew Del Negro Written by David Feeney and John Quaintance. Directed by Anne Fletcher. Rated “PG-13”

HollywoodChicago.com senior staff writer Patrick McDonald

By PATRICK McDONALD
Writer, Editorial Coordinator
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

© 2015 Patrick McDonald, HollywoodChicago.com

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