Several years after the end of I Spy, costars Robert Culp and Bill Cosby reunited for this downbeat curio involving two private eyes trying to survive in a lovingly seedy Los Angeles of decrepit strip clubs, money-launderers, and sunbathing crime lords. "There's nothing left in this profession; it's not about anything," complains private eye Hickey (Culp) while shaking off another night of heavy drinking. His partner Boggs (Cosby) still has the emotional cool and muscle control that Hickey long since drank away, but that might not go far when their search for a missing woman leads to a violent criminal underworld. Buddy-movie pyrotechnics aside, Hickey & Boggs is a surprisingly atmospheric effort by director Culp, who seems more concerned with impressionistic glimpses of Los Angeles than with the plot. A wordless beginning in Union Station leads to chases down abandoned streets, showdowns on unoccupied beaches, and fights at unfilled sports stadiums, creating a sense of Los Angeles as an urban ghost-world whose community structures have been forsaken by humanity and reclaimed by scavengers.