23. Fletch Lives (1989)

Director: Michael Ritchie
Starring: Chevy Chase, Hal Holbrook, Julianne Phillips, R. Lee Ermey, Randall "Tex" Cobb, Cleavon Little, Richard Belzer

There's a passionate sect of movie lovers who swear by the 1985 comedy Fletch, and for good reason. It's one of Chevy Chase's funniest pics, granting the sly funnyman ample space to drop clever one-liners and ham it up with reckless abandon. In Fletch, he plays an incognito investigative journalist who stumbles upon a drug ring; full of humorous disguises and inane aliases, it's a consistently funny romp that at times also works as a legitimate mystery thriller.

Fletch may be overly silly, but it's an exercise in stone-faced restraint compared to its rancid sequel, Fletch Lives. Chase does little more than act a fool in even more disguises than before, and none of them work; amongst Fletch's lame characters are a drag queen, an uptight nerd wrongfully in a biker bar, and a KKK member. Chase himself seems to be having a blast throughout Fletch Lives; that makes one of us.