classicsoncall
If you enjoy movie parody, this send-up of Bogart classics will be right up your alley. The nods to "Casablanca" and "The Maltese Falcon" are plainly obvious, with more than a passing reference in the latter part of the picture to "The Big Sleep". You could tell the principal players were having a hoot of a time filming this; just watch Louise Fletcher as she caresses Peter Falk's shoulder in that scene where he tells her he has a bottle of champagne he bought for the honeymoon that never was. When he mentions that the bread and cheese got hard as a rock, she starts to crack up before gaining composure again.With the usual gang of idiots like Madeline Kahn and Dom DeLuise on hand, one might think this was a Mel Brooks production, but this one comes courtesy of Neil Simon and director Robert Moore. It's almost impossible to pick out a favorite funny moment because there are so many quips and sight gags it's hard to keep up. Every time Lou Peckinpaugh (Peter Falk) opens a nightstand or desk drawer he's pulling out a ready made drink, doing so with the greatest equanimity. Each of the female leads was a blast and a half, pulling off their impersonations perfectly, with both Eileen Brennan and Ann-Margret sending up Bogey's main squeeze, Lauren Bacall.While it's fun to play the match game with the characters here with those in Bogart's actual films, I guess my favorite would have been Madeline Kahn doing the Mary Astor thing from "The Maltese Falcon" with all the phony aliases. Scatman Crothers is also in fine form as piano player Tinker, reprising the Dooley Wilson role as Sam in "Casablanca". I would never have guessed that 'Jeepers, Creepers' was on Lou's forbidden song list the same way 'As Time Goes By' was for Rick Blaine. Not enough romance in it I guess.A couple years after this film came out, Robert Sacchi did a similar turn in "The Man With Bogart's Face", another parody heavy on the Casablanca and Maltese Falcon references. The one thing he did that Peter Falk didn't even try was Bogey's familiar facial grimace in a tense situation, although by the time that picture was finished he might have overdone it. So if it comes to making a recommendation between the two flicks, I'd have to paraphrase Rick Blaine from "Casablanca" or Marlene DuChard (Louise Fletcher) in this one - "Of all the cheap gin joints and film noir knock-offs in this world, I pick this one".
dougdoepke
Hilarious spoof of Bogart's iconic roles. The jibes fly fast and furious, so best to keep a scorecard. I love it when Madelyn Kahn (I think) keeps piling on the aliases one after another in true mystery woman fashion. Frankly, I had trouble telling all the women apart, what with their big hats from the 1940's. Then there're all these great impersonations of iconic characters like Lorre and Greenstreet, only here they're "Damascus" and "Blubber". And get a load of fall-guy Paul Williams slapping himself silly in true Elisha Cook fashion. Okay, I'll probably never be able to watch Casablanca (1942) or The Maltese Falcon (1941) the same way again, but it's probably worth it. Anyway, the spoof's an iconoclastic treat for old movie fans, that is, if you don't mind seeing movie gods lampooned a bit for a good laugh.
D_Burke
The idea of "The Cheap Detective" was to be a spoof of the Humphrey Bogart classic movies "Casablanca" (1942) and "The Maltese Falcone" (1941), both of which were arguably Bogart's most famous movies (if, perhaps, you don't count "The African Queen" (1951)). It showed a lot of promise with it being written by the brilliant Neil Simon, who wrote such great plays as "The Odd Couple", "The Sunshine Boys", and "The Goodbye Girl" to name a few. The aforementioned plays also went on to become great movies as well. However, despite the accomplished team behind the also funny "Murder By Death" (1976) (including Simon, director Robert Moore, and some members of the cast), "The Cheap Detective" felt flat and uninspired as a comedy.I could not find any information about how this film did when it was originally released in 1978, although I'm sure "Murder By Death" did better. However, there was another famous big-budget movie with an all star cast that was also released in 1978 which failed miserably. That movie was "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", and I think (although I don't know for sure) that "The Cheap Detective" failed for similar reasons."The Cheap Detective", like "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", had a noticeably large budget, an all-star cast, and all stars working behind the scene too. The problem for me with "The Cheap Detective" was not the writing so much as the delivery of the lines from the main actors. I love Peter Falk, and I think he's usually great in whatever movie he's in, even if it's "Corky Romano" (2001). However, half of the time I couldn't understand what he was saying, almost as if he took it upon himself to impersonate Humphrey Bogart instead of just playing a hard-boiled detective. This spoof movie is very dialogue-heavy, and relies very little on physical gags, and there's nothing wrong with that. After all, recent spoof movies like "Meet The Spartans" and "Disaster Movie" was almost all physical gags, and those movies were just rotten! That being said, if your laughs come solely, or mostly, from dialogue, you have to make sure the audience can actually understand what you're saying.While the rest of the cast was not as difficult to understand, many of the lines failed miserably upon delivery mostly due to poor timing. It's surprising too, because there were comic actors in this movie who are still considered comic legends, such as Sid Caesar, Phil Silvers, Dom DeLuise, and Madeline Kahn. Although these actors shined in other classic comedy films (especially DeLuise and Kahn, who were great in Mel Brooks movies of the time), their attempts at comedy here felt weak.Another big problem with the movie was the supporting women in it; the vixens if you will. With Madeline Kahn, Stockard Channing, and (especially) Ann-Margret being the primary exceptions, the other women in this movie weren't especially attractive. It sounds very pig-headed of me to say this, but attractive women as vixens create a necessary tension which makes more room for comedy in these kinds of situations. It's difficult to explain entirely, but regardless, these other women seemed wooden and delivered their funny lines with even less accurate timing than the comic legends. Eileen Brennan seemed very out of place in this movie, and came out looking like Jessica Rabbit's grandmother. This movie seemed to try to deny her age entirely, and try way too hard to make her a convincing leading lady. Needless to say, she failed.Above all, spoof movie or not, movies work best when a story is being told, and when you care about the characters portrayed. Bogart's movies worked well because of those elements. This movie did not. There was just too much going on, too many cheap gags, and bad timing on the lines. My guess was that Neil Simon was surrounded by a bunch of "yes" men during the writing of this film, as was the rest of the cast. Someone should have been the objective person on the set and said, "This is not really as funny as it should be. Let's try it this way instead". I'd be willing to bet that if Simon and Moore collaborated with Mel Brooks on this film, it would be considered as timeless as "High Anxiety" and "History of the World Part I" is today. I'm not a big Hitchcock fan or history buff personally, but I still found both of those movies very funny and very enjoyable even after multiple viewings. Not this movie, though. I can't quite recommend it.
