Among the actors honored in Summer Under the Stars last August was Ossie Davis, and this of course gave me the opportunity to record several movies I hadn't heard of. (One turned out to be a TV movie, since there apparently weren't enough film roles to spotlight.) Some of the roles were also decidedly supporting roles, as in Hot Stuff.
The nominal star, and also director, was Dom DeLuise. He plays Ernie Fortunato, and as the movie opens he's in a pre-credits car chase, riding shotgun with Doug (Jerry Reed) and their friend Ramon (Luis Ávalos) in the back seat, going along the roads of Miami. The scene makes it seem is though Hot Stuff is going to be some sort of caper movie, although after the car chase and shootout it's revealed that Ernie and friends are actually undercover police detectives in Miami, working for Captain Geiberger (Ossie Davis).
After the credits, Ernie and friends are patrolling the streets of Miami, spotting someone who looks like he's stolen a guitar. The cops give chase, only to be waylaid by a woman, Louise (Suzanne Pleshette). They're none too pleased about getting a gun drawn on them by this woman, but the punchline for this scene is that she too is a police detective and didn't realize that she was aiming her gun at some of her colleagues.
All of them are irritated by the idea that all of the people stealing expensive goods and then fencing the goods are getting away with it. So they come up with a daring idea: find some warehouse space to rent, and set themselves up as procurers of stolen goods, which they'll keep in the warehouse in back as evidence of the crimes that other people are committing. They'll also set up a hidden camera and film the transactions as well as taking down all of the names of the people selling them stolen goods. Capt. Geiberger isn't too certain of the scheme, but lets them go ahead with it on the proviso that if they're caught out Geiberger and his superiors will disavow all knowledge of the scheme.
Ernie and his friends quickly prove themselves to be almost the gang that couldn't shoot straight, to the point that you wonder how they're not discovered to be cops almost from the first transaction. But then Hot Stuff is a comedy. A good portion of the comedy comes from the seeming incompetence of the police, while some comes from the wacky criminals who fence stuff and the stuff that they're fencing.
Eventually, the cops run out of money to buy more stuff, and it might be time to make arrests, but how to do so without breaking cover? Obviously with the first person they arrest everybody else is going to get word and disappear. So the cops come up with another audacious plan, which is to have a big party for everybody who does business with them, and do a mass arrest at that party.
Having watched several Dom DeLuise movies, one thing I've concluded is that he was the sort of actor who worked well as a character actor and needed to have someone as director who could rein him in. In Hot Stuff, however, DeLuise is the nominal lead (although it's really an ensemble cast), and he's directing himself. So the material is somewhat out of control and much of it feels as though you wonder whether DeLuise had any knowledge of police work. Even with those problems, however, the material just about works since everybody seems like they're having a lot of fun making the movie.
Hot Stuff isn't a terrible movie, but having watched it, I can see why it's the sort of movie that fell into obscurity.
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