When we hear about detective films, we generally expect to interact with complex, difficult characters with delicate existential crises. But we often forget that in world cinema there are also some special characters such as Ace Ventura or Johnny English. Well, Sean McParland’s short film manages to combine these two contradictory cinematic formulas in an ambiguous manner similar to some movies like In Bruges, homogenizing in a few minutes a classic narrative thread with the profiles of two funny and attaching detectives that recycle some of the more attractive typological elements of policier comedies. Without aiming to revolutionize the detective-drama genre, ‘Dunt, Kent & Wolf‘ is rather an exercise in admiration brought to some successful worldwide productions, offering to viewers a bittersweet and cynical experience about the hilarious attempt of a detective couple to capture a serial killer, using all the stylistic components specific to the genre’s suspenseful atmosphere.
Dunt and Kent are two cops who have to arrest Wolf, a fishy serial killer. The two partners are forced to find an effective way to penetrate Wolf’s intimate area, but the protagonists’ “disguise” risks being too cheap for the antagonist’s terrifying perspicacity.
By opting for a linear narrative and funny dialogue interaction, Sean McParland avoids arborescent detective structures to primarily focus on sketching some slightly caricaturesque characters that conceal a subtle irony to the classic schematism of this cinematic pattern. Thus, it is difficult to say if the spectators passionate about detective stories will enjoy this project, since the action itself is less important than the protagonists’ contrasting magnetism that brings together the defining features of some famous comic Pinky-and-the-Brain-like couples. However, the ambivalent strategy by which the director creates an atmosphere sometimes light, specific to a comedy, sometimes tense, almost nightmarish, will succeed if not to capture the attention of many categories of viewers, then provide a refreshing experience to anyone. ‘Dunt, Kent & Wolf’ is a promising project designed as a light stylistic exercise that activates some of the most attractive elements of detective comedy to create a familiar and at the same time bizarre fictional universe cynically depicting the eternal struggle between the good and the bad guys.
