I. M. Fletcher, the wisecracking reporter/sleuth of Gregory Mcdonald's best-selling mystery novels, comes to the screen at last in the person of Chevy Chase, who seems ideally suited to the steady stream of assumed identities and deceptive patter which are the modus operandi of this Los Angeles-based gumshoe. Director Michael Ritchie's own m.o. is a deft flair for satiric comedy and mystery in equal parts. The story finds Fletch posing as a beach bum to get a story when he is recruited for a hit by a business tycoon who has a contract out--on himself.