Hot Stuff

In Miami in Florida, cops Dom Deluise, Suzanne Pleshette, Jerry Reed, and Luis Avalos run a fencing operation as a sting.

It's highly episodic and pretty funny, too, as you might expect with Donald Westlake doing the scripting with Michael Kane. The large and varied cast includes Ossie David, Marc Lawrence, Pat McCormick, and Sidney Lassick. The movie has a loose, cobbled-together feel that indicates its incidents are drawn from police files somewhere, and the performers manage to always sound like they're making it up as it goes along -- except for Lawrence, which lends a comedy air of its own.

I saw this with the neighbors kids in the summer of 79 at the theatre, and thought what an odd film it was. Essentially Dom Deluise and Jerry Reed reprise their Smokey and the Bandit chemistry to organize an urban fence for a police sting.

As a kid I simply didn't understand too much of the plot, but thought it was entertaining in a sort of silly-adults acting silly sort of way. It's also got a kind of happy yet "justice is served" ending for what it's worth, making all feel happy at the end.

Kind of an odd film that deals with law enforcement, stolen goods and the "human" side of crime (if you can call it that). I'm not sure it's a film I'd see again, but I didn't mind seeing it the first time, and I think I caught it a couple more times on HBO a couple years later.

Give it a shot.

Pleshette, deluise, and a couple other coppers come up with a unique way to catch crooks. Instead of chasing after them, they open a down low pawn shop, and record the thugs fencing stolen goods! Which works great, until the local mafia don tries to muscle in. It's quite good! Pretty fast paced. Nothing too complicated. It's all light and fun. Directed by deluise himself. One of only two he directed.and if you check the cast list, deluise managed to get a whole lot of his family on the payroll. This was just after pleshette had finished with bob newhart.

Deluise had already done blazing saddles and a bunch of his goofy 1970s film.

This is a funny movie. It was way too long in coming to DVD. I bought it for my sons and brother for Christmas. We worn out the VHS copy.

The ensemble cast is excellent. Each character has its unique personality. Very well acted, and it looks like they had a lot of fun making this. Sadly most every one of the main characters are gone now.

It does have the repertoire company of Burt Reynolds, but I think it is a better film with this cast then if Burt had taken the lead.

I wish Dom DeLuise had made more films. He became more interested in cooking later in life. He was a very funny man. I used to love him on Johnny Carson.

Please take the time to seek out this movie. You'll enjoy it!

Pleasing screwball comedy about Miami cops who catch petty thieves through a fencing front. DeLuise excels as star and director, as do Reed and Pleshette.