Run Fat Boy Run

A hapless schlemiel (Simon Pegg) has been a quitter most of his life, including having run out on his pregnant girlfriend (Thandie Newton) five years ago. Now he hopes to regain her respect by running a marathon against her too-good-to-be-true new boyfriend (Hank Azaria). But old habits (especially bad ones) die hard. American actor David Schwimmer makes his directing debut, interestingly enough, with a British blue-collar comedy—a script, in fact, co-written by the Englishman Pegg with Schwimmer’s compatriot Michael Ian Black. It’s a sort of mid-Atlantic compromise, less crude and raucous than a U.S. film, less twee and whimsical than something like The Full Monty or Calendar Girls. That is, a bit rude and uncouth, but sweetly affecting, thanks to Pegg’s performance as an incorrigible but likeable screw-up.