Focus film reviewer, Patty Papageorgiou-Axford reviews the 3rd film in Edgar Wright’s ‘The Cornetto Trilogy’
School’s out forever and 5 leavers set off on a celebratory pub crawl, a tradition in their hometown of Newton Haven. The Golden Mile, as it is known, passes through every single pub in town, the last one being, of course, The World’s End. Unsurprisingly, the lads fail to complete the challenge, dropping off one by one along the way in a drunken stupor. 20 years later, leader of the pack Gary King (Simon Pegg) – now professional wastrel – decides to reunite the alienated gang and undertake the challenge once again, this time determined to “see it to the bitter… or lager end”. Grudgingly, the old friends accept and the five find themselves at their old stomping grounds where they discover everything is not as it seems…
The third instalment in the Pegg / Frost / Wright “Cornetto Trilogy” will get some chuckles out of viewers, but sadly does little more than follow a formula set by the previous films (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz). Normal, sometimes downtrodden characters dealing with circumstances beyond the ordinary: Shaun Of The Dead brilliantly parodied zombie movies while simultaneously earning a place in the genre itself. In Hot Fuzz, a murder investigation revealed bizarre cult activity in a small rural town. And The World’s End brings us… alien robots?
This filmmaking trio would normally have no issues tackling as silly a premise as this one – it is what they do after all. But for some reason, they don’t quite pull it off this time. The screenplay seems hasty, overly expositional and unlike the other films, the characters are little more than caricatures. The comedy factor relies on slapstick and nonsensical action scenes involving ways of dismembering or smashing up humanoid robots. A few attempts at drama don’t really meld with the rest of the content and it is unclear whether these scenes are meant to be poignant or tongue in cheek.
Undoubtedly the filmmakers had as much fun making this movie as the rest – fans will certainly enjoy it, no doubt, but I suspect this one may be the less memorable of the “trilogy”.
