Carl Reiner's pastiche of 1940s film noir and the erotic thriller genre smashes together spoofs of Double Indemnity, Body Heat, Cape Fear, Sleeping with the Enemy, Fatal Attraction and Basic Instinct. A lot of the reason this works for me is because Armand Assante completely commits to the bit as a completely oblivious buffoon (he plays both a cop and a lawyer here). As with all parodies, it's exhausting if you're not in a receptive mood, but at just under 90 minutes, these films tend not to overstay their welcome. While some of the gags are hysterical, it seems to work better in smaller doses, and it's a bit uneven as a whole. This type of genre has to take big swings, even when it's batting 1 for 2.
2½ traumatized skunks out of 5
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