I had to watch this a second time to appreciate it. The story is not the most impressive; but the concept is. Steve Martin plays a detective in a parody of classic film noir. The movie features actual scenes cut from several films and blended with precision. These skillful splices feature some of the great names from old time Hollywood. Names like Cagney, Douglas, Davis, Crawford and Bergman.

Martin really shows his talent and ability to make a scene imitate reality. His comedic wit is sharp as a switchblade. His co-star is Rachel Ward, who can vamp or play coy with the best of them. Along with directing, Carl Reiner has a cameo part.

Swift directing, with superb lighting and shading made this black and white crime comedy shine.

Carl Reiner, the multi-talented director of this film, is the only one that could have pulled it off. Working with George Gipe, and Steve Martin in the screen play that serves as the basis of the movie, Mr. Reiner has done the impossible with "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid".

Of course, this film is blessed with the magnificent editing by Bud Malin, who meshed the present images against those film noir masterpieces we see, blending the characters of this movie with the stars of the past, in what seems to be a seamless product. It also helps that Miklos Rozsa was the man composing the music, as everything shows a cohesiveness that is hard to distinguished in what was shot in 1982 and the old movies.

This spoof to the film noir genre is a pure delight. The main character, Rigby Reardon is the P.I. from hell, but thanks to the creators of this movie, he is perfect as the man at the center of the action.

Not being a Steve Martin fan, one has to recognize that when this actor is inspired, he can do excellent work. It would appear that with a director like Carl Reiner, he would have gone off the top, but instead, Mr. Martin gives a good reading of Rigby. Rachel Ward, as the typical woman of those films, is charming. Reni Santoni, Georege Gaynes and the rest of the supporting cast do wonders under Carl Reiner's orders.

The film brought back memories of those timeless masterpieces of the past and the stars that shone in them. We get to see Humphrey Bogart, Ava Gardner, Ingrid Bergman, Vincent Price, Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, Barbara Stanwyck, Fred McMurray, Edward G. Robinson, and the others at the height of their fame playing against the present cast and making the viewer happy watching all the antics which Mr. Reiner and his team have created for our amusement.

This is a funny look at the old movies!

This is a film that must be seen by connoisseurs of film noir twice. the first time is before they begin their detailed study of film noir to see it in an innocent state of mind, and then to watch it again after they've seen the hundreds of 1940's and 50's classics of that genre, with this film representing only films from the 1940's. Some of the film clips work, but others do not, and like the main plot line involving stolen cheese formulas, it can be very pungent.

It is appropriate that this was the final film, dedicated to Edith Head who did some of the wardrobe of the vintage stars in this film. But while the pastiche of the genre of film noir is utilize with much respect, the modern footage and script is often crude and out of place. While there were sexual undercurrents in film noir, they were never latent, so recurring gags involving Steve Martin readjusting Rachel Ward's breasts seem completely out of whack with the genre this is supposed to be lovingly spoofing. One of the modern recurring gags it does work is the way Ward removes bullets from Martin every time he happens to get shot, which is frequent.

Then there are the classic stars interspersed in the film in ways that technically don't always succeed but are amusing if you know the particular film it comes from. It is obvious when Martin calls up Barbara Stanwyck in "Sorry, Wrong Number" and listens to that in one sequence, they forgot to have the music from her radio coming out of his phone receiver. A sequence with Humphrey Bogart (who actually plays a supporting role, utilized in more than just a few scenes) appears to show Bogart and Martin together and is very clever.

Bette Davis, in "Deception", is made fun of because of her character's use of allegedly stale bread, but her appearance really has no impact on the film's plot other than to show us Martin's reaction to hearing "cleaning woman". Lana Turner, Veronica Lake, Joan Crawford and Ava Gardner (looking the same in clips from two films) show, along with Stanwyck and Davis, much more star quality than Rachel Ward could ever hope to insinuate. Kirk Douglas and Edward Arnold are commanding in their single sequences with Arnold hysterically reacting to the presence of the puppy that Martin brings him. Alan Ladd's appearance is so blurred within the action that you only really get a brief glimpse of him.

Overall, the general plot is certainly not as complex or interesting as many of the individual classic movies shown here. Threats of a sequel at the end (with the pointless promise of a nude scene by Ward) fortunately never coming to fruition. Spoofing an entire genre of a film with in 90 minutes is very risky because it had been done better with intentional farce on that long-running variety show and by Mel Brooks in several films. The comedy seems forced here and while well-intended, ends up being a misfire. The first time I saw this film, I paid attention mainly to the classic movie footage rather than the plot overall, but nearly 40 years later and having seen all of these films (some several times),I found I had to change my ranking of the film to being a disappointment.