- Title: Fletch
- IMDb: link
Flashback Friday takes us back to the 1980s and an investigative reporter who stumbles upon corruption and murder. Fletch may be the quintessential Chevy Chase movie. One could certainly argue for National Lampoon’s Vacation or Caddyshack, although the latter is more of an ensemble piece. With Fletch, Chase carries the film from beginning to end through a variety of ad-libs, jokes, gags, and sarcastic remarks while breaking not one but two big stories in less than a week. When you think of Chase’s style of humor, it’s hard not to think of Fletch.
Adapted from the first of the less comedic novels of Gregory Mcdonald, the movie allowed plenty of improvisation for the star including the running gag of Fletch using ridiculous aliases, and often goofy disguises, to hide his true identity while doing his snooping. While investigating corruption on the beach, spending his days as a beach bum, Fletch is approached by millionaire Alan Stanwyk (Tim Matheson) who asks Fletch to murder him. Even for Fletch, this is an unusual request.
Despite the deadline on the beach story, and being hounded by his editor (Richard Libertini), Fletch will spend the majority of the film’s 98 minutes instead investigating Stanwyk including spending quite a bit of time hitting on the man’s wife (Dana Wheeler-Nicholson) to uncover what the man is truly after. Eventually the two stories will blend together with the reveal that Stanwyk is in league with the crooked cop (Joe Don Baker) who attempted to scare Fletch off the beach story.
An immediate success with both audiences and critics, Fletch is fun, often goofy fun, but fun nonetheless. Chase gets the majority of the credit here in the role he often stated is the favorite of his career, although both Matheson and Dana Wheeler-Nicholson are both quite good as well in the two most pivotal supporting roles. Other recognizable faces include George Wendt, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (playing himself in Fletch’s fantasy of playing for the Lakers), James Avery, M. Emmet Walsh, and Geena Davis as a colleague at the paper whose name provides easy fodder for jokes more than once.
Watch the trailer
