Fondly remembered, if not really very good, the two Chevy Chase films made from Gregory McDonald’s Fletch character, only emphasized the snide ‘I’m Chevy Chase and you’re not’ side of his personality. So the bar isn’t all that high for Greg Mottola's Fletch reboot with the far more appealing Jon Hamm taking on the investigating reporter, reveling in his slip from corporate executive hunk to middle-age future as he haphazardly solves a tricky case of kidnapping, art theft and murder pointing in his direction. The sticker on the poster, ‘Now A Major Motion Picture!,’ gets it completely wrong. Rather, ‘Now A Minor Motion Picture!’ and happy to be that way. Alas, that don’t-give-a-fuck attitude is the best thing about the film, along with Hamm’s vanity-free perf and his unwelcomed tag-team relationship with police detective Roy Wood Jr. Elsewhere, the plotting is a hot mess; the eccentric characters played a bit too broadly (what accent was Marcia Gay Harden aiming at?), the central mystery/murder suspense-free.* Still, 60% of the way to breezy not bad for a first try. Hopefully, an already announced sequel will build on what works and fix what doesn’t.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: The early THIN MAN movies with William Powell & Myrna Loy show how to do these things. Here’s the second in the series. Maybe that’s what they should have rebooted. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2016/11/after-thin-man-1936.html
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Perhaps this would have played better set in the ‘70s when the book was published. It also would have cost twice as much to produce.
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