1253. Run Fatboy Run (2007)

Starring: Simon Pegg, Thandie Newton, Hank Azaria

Director: David Schwimmer

Running Time: 100 mins

Run Fatboy Run is a British film about a man who, five years after leaving his pregnant fiancée at the altar, decides to get in shape and run a marathon in an attempt to win her back.

This is a pretty formulaic romantic comedy. You’ve seen it all before, and it doesn’t really offer anything new. Moving at a snail’s pace for the majority of the first act, this would have been a pretty tough watch if it didn’t have such a good sense of fun. I’m not saying it was hilarious, but thanks to the performances, and some good gags, I enjoyed Run Fatboy Run.

Before I get into the big issues with this film, however, I’m going to start with the best part of it all, and that’s the ending. In fact, the final forty minutes, where we see Simon Pegg take on a marathon around London sponsored by Nike (who did a pretty good job with their product placement seeing as everyone in the film wore Nike shoes).

Anyway, although I didn’t love the first hour, the final act is pretty enjoyable. The main joke is both fun and at the same time almost inspiring. Yes, it’s insanely cheesy, but for some reason I really bought this man’s struggle to finish the marathon, and that made it pretty good fun to watch.

That said, it was a bit of a struggle to get to those final forty minutes, because the first two acts of this film aren’t just formulaic, but really, really slow. Yes, Simon Pegg, Thandie Newton and the rest of the cast are all fun to watch, and a couple of jokes got a laugh out of me, but for the most part, I didn’t care enough about the romance, simply because it was exactly the same as everything we’ve seen in this genre, whilst a large amount of the jokes were just too dumb and cheap to really deserve a good laugh.

In the end, Run Fatboy Run is fine. We’ve seen it all before, and the first hour, following the rom-com formula, was a little tougher than I would have liked, but thanks to some entertaining performances and a really enjoyable final act, I enjoyed the film on the whole, so that’s why it gets a 7.2 from me.