Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid 1982
Though I like Steve Martin, somehow I never saw this movie, so I was happy to borrow it using a Screen Pass. Since the movie edits in snippets of old noir movies, I thought it might help that I have been catching up on some old movies, but I was still only familiar with a couple of the movies (Double Indemnity and Notorious), though I have seen more movies by some of the old stars, maybe. Essentially it is a detective movie, similar to The Maltese Falcon, with mostly modern footage in black and white, blended with pieces of old movies. It works best with footage of phone calls, but there are scenes where the modern footage is blended into the picture or just edited in, sometimes fairly effectively, sometimes not. It seems like it would be easier to do, but it is still pretty clumsy. Still, Martin and his femme fatale, Rachel Ward, do some good work and it stays entertaining, working as a comedy, but also a mystery, plus the novelty of seeing the old movies incorporated. So while none of them work great, togther they make for a pretty good movie.
Written: 10 May 2022