Dragnet(1987)

While Friday (Dan Aykroyd) and Streebek (Tom Hanks) are making their way back to the police station following the end of a rotten workday, Streebek turns on the TV on his wristwatch and finds it is tuned in to the Law and Order Foundation Dinner. One of the reporters remarks that Mayor Parvin (Bruce Gray) is fighting for his political survival, and the attack against him is being led by Police Commissioner Kirkpatrick (Elizabeth Ashley), who ordered Friday and Streebek off the PAGAN (People Against Goodness And Normalcy) case earlier that day because they didn’t have any evidence of the gathering that PAGAN held the night before in the San Gabriel Mountains where they saved “The Virgin” Connie Swail (Alexandra Paul) from being sacrificed. Kirkpatrick tells the assembly that Mayor Parvin needs to resign from office immediately because of his inability to properly deal with PAGAN and their crimes, and then Reverend Whirley (Christopher Plummer) takes the podium and announces that softcore porn lord Jerry Caesar (Dabney Coleman) – who had his entire run of Bait Magazine’s 25th anniversary issue stolen by PAGAN – has decided to help him in the fight against crime by donating $1 million to his group, the Moral Advance Movement of America (MAMA).

When Friday and Streebek get back to the police station, Streebek asks Friday if he wants to get something to eat with him, but Friday replies that he can’t because he has plans. Streebek asks what they are, but Friday won’t tell him. However, after Friday takes off, Streebek decides to get on his motorcycle and go after him, curious as to what his plans are. He follows Friday to what turns out to be the home of Friday’s grandmother, Granny Mundy (Lenka Peterson), and he announces himself as soon as Friday steps out of the house with her. After Streebek introduces himself to Mundy, she tells him that it is her birthday today and that Friday is about to take her to the Brown Derby for dinner. She invites him to join them, but Friday tells his grandmother that he doesn’t think that that is a good idea because he has already invited a woman to join them, pleasantly surprising Streebek and Mundy because that means that he has a date. Mundy still decides to let Streebek come along, so Friday takes Mundy in his car to the Brown Derby with Streebek tailing them, and inside, they meet the woman, who turns out to be Connie.

However, shortly after taking a seat at their table, Connie notices Whirley sitting at a table not far from theirs with Kirkpatrick and Capt. Gannon (Harry Morgan) and becomes terrified, and she tells Friday that Whirley was the man who served as the masked high priest at the PAGAN gathering and was the one who had her kidnapped. Friday is ready to arrest Whirley on the spot, but Streebek advises him against it by pointing out that, because Whirley is seen as a public hero, you can’t just walk up to somebody like him and arrest him. He also tells Friday that Gannon and Kirkpatrick are sitting with Whirley, so if he arrests him here and now, they will rake him over the coals for it. Undeterred, Friday confronts and cuffs Whirley when he goes to use the men’s washroom, and afterwards, he brings him before Gannon and Kirkpatrick and tells them all about how Whirley had his men abduct and nearly kill Connie and how he is also in possession of 3,000 gallons worth of two chemicals that become a deadly gas when you combine them. Unfortunately, Gannon and Kirkpatrick refuse to listen to him at all, and Kirkpatrick orders Friday to uncuff Whirley and then turn in his badge because he is relieved from duty. After Whirley and Kirkpatrick leave together, Friday surrenders his badge and gun to Gannon, and when Streebek tells Friday that he will pick up where he left off, Gannon warns him that, if he comes within one mile of Whirley, he will take his badge, too. Gannon then leaves, and after Granny Mundy decides that she wants to get some chili dogs, Streebek decides to take her on his motorcycle to get them, leaving Friday to entertain Connie because he knows that they have a budding attraction to each other. They drive out to the Hollywood sign and talk some more, but before they can share their first kiss, Whirley’s right-hand man (and Jerry Caesar’s driver), Emil Muzz (Jack O’Halloran), suddenly attacks their car and manages to flip it upside down, then holds them hostage with a shotgun.

The next morning, Streebek attempts to call both Friday and Connie, but Friday doesn’t answer his phone, and Connie’s mother tells him that she never came home last night. Streebek thus deduces that something went wrong with them both, but when he voices his concerns to Gannon, Gannon replies that he couldn’t care less. Streebek soon looks at a photograph that he and Friday earlier recovered from the garbage of Muzz’s old apartment showing two of Caesar’s “Baitmates” at Muscle Beach along with a number to call them written on the back of the picture, and after coming to the conclusion that Muzz might frequent Muscle Beach, he goes down there in the hope of finding him. Sure enough, Streebek finds Muzz working out there, so he confronts him with gun drawn while he has a heavy weightlifting bar over his head and demands to know where Friday is. Meanwhile, Caesar secretly meets with Whirley, and as they chat, we find out that they and Kirkpatrick are all in on a scheme to get Mayor Parvin removed from office; Parvin is still not responding to Whirley’s and Kirkpatrick’s pressure to resign, so Whirley mentioned Caesar’s $1 million contribution to MAMA as a means of getting Parvin to attend Caesar’s 25th anniversary party for his magazine tonight. It will then be Caesar’s job to ensure that Parvin gets intoxicated and acts like an idiot, plus he must take pictures of it all. The photos will be the final nail in the coffin for Parvin’s political career, and it will allow Kirkpatrick to easily win the next mayoral election. This will also result in Whirley and Caesar splitting effective control of Los Angeles between them; Caesar will monopolize all pornography and half of the city will buy it from him, and the other half will fund Whirley with the means to fight it. After a satisfied Caesar leaves, Kirkpatrick pops up from a hiding place and tells Whirley that she does not trust Caesar, but Whirley basically tells her that he is just leading Caesar on and that he won’t be alive after tonight (his true plan is to use the deadly gas at the party to kill both Caesar and Parvin [along with everyone else], then secretly take over Caesar’s operation so he can control both sides of the moral conflict. Obviously, Caesar doesn’t know that Whirley is the leader of PAGAN, nor does he know that Muzz works for him).

That night, we see Friday and Connie tied up on a chair in the Griffith Park Observatory, and Whirley comes in with a henchman and tells him to untie Connie because she will be coming with him, then he tells Streebek all about his sinister plans for Caesar’s party. Shortly after Whirley puts Connie into his limousine and leaves with her, Streebek drives in on his motorcycle, and he finds and rescues Friday before Whirley’s goons can kill him. They then run out of the observatory and onto Streebek’s motorcycle, and after a short chase, they manage to lose the thugs by driving into the woods. Friday and Streebek are next seen hiding in the bushes outside the front gate of Caesar’s mansion, and they watch as Parvin makes his arrival, followed by Whirley, but Friday sees that Connie is not with Whirley. Friday is keen on sneaking onto the property and into the party, but Streebek halts him by telling him that he does not have a warrant, plus he reminds him that he is not a police officer anymore and he will never get his badge back if he goes in there. Friday tells him that Whirley is the only one who knows where Connie is, and when he declares that he is going to shove Whirley’s collar down his throat if he doesn’t give up her location when he confronts him, Streebek remarks that he is clearly thinking like a man in love and not like a cop. Friday is still eager to go inside, but Streebek informs him that that will lead to him getting arrested and charged for impersonating a police officer. He then tells Friday that, in spite of every logical instinct he has ever had in his life, he considers him a real friend. He then orders Friday to go home before sneaking his way onto the mansion grounds.

Streebek locates the entire hose assembly that the members of PAGAN are preparing to use to pump the poison gas from a stolen tanker truck into the mansion, and he also sees two dump trucks show up with all the stolen Bait magazines, which the goons promptly dump out at the main gates of the mansion and start pouring gasoline onto, intending to light them on fire as another act against Caesar. Streebek soon barges into the group’s control van, and after knocking out the lone goon communicating with the other PAGANs, he calls Gannon at home and lets him know that he is up at the Caesar mansion before telling him to call SWAT because a small army of PAGANs are here. He then puts on an outfit identical to what the other PAGAN members are wearing and helps them and Muzz with putting the gasoline onto the magazines (and thankfully, Muzz fails to notice him), during which he overhears a departing Whirley telling Muzz that he is leaving him in charge of things here because he is heading off to join a “special passenger” on his private jet for a few restful days in Acapulco. He then flings his cigar onto the magazines to get the fire started before driving away.

A squadron of SWAT officers and emergency vehicles are then seen driving up the road to Caesar’s place, passing Friday in his car as they go, and when they reach the main gates, they almost immediately get into a gunfight with Muzz and the PAGANs, and bullets from the gunfight enter the mansion and cause panic. A SWAT tank then drives up the road and uses its battering ram to break down the gates, and the police come in behind it and start laying waste to the villains. Friday then emerges from the tank, having commandeered it, and he starts shooting at the PAGANs with a shotgun. Streebek then joins in on the action, beating up some PAGANs in hand-to-hand combat. He then gets confronted by a gun-toting Muzz, but before Muzz can pull the trigger, Friday appears behind him with his shotgun pointed at his temple. He then gives Muzz a few good hits with the shotgun before Streebek puts him under arrest.

As the cops start to round up and cuff the surviving PAGAN members, a very grateful Caesar runs up to Friday and thanks him for saving his life, his women, and his property. Streebek then comes up to Friday and tells him that Whirley is heading for Mexico in his private jet, and Friday remarks that he has Connie, so they need to get to the airport now. After exiting the main gates, they bump into Gannon, who commends them for their good work. Streebek tells him that they still have a fugitive to apprehend, but Gannon informs him that he can’t let him take Friday with him on a hot pursuit because Friday is a civilian. He then surprises Friday by giving him his badge back so he can pursue Whirley legally, remarking that he didn’t have the heart to turn it in. Friday and Streebek then hop into a squad car and race to the airport.

Whirley arrives at his waiting jet at the L.A. Airport and is met by Kirkpatrick, who tells him that she just heard over a police radio that the cops have stormed the mansion and learned everything about what they have done, and she acknowledges that they are finished. He asks her if Connie is aboard the jet, and she replies that she is, but they might as well let her go because there is no point in keeping her. He tells her that she is right, then instructs her to watch for the police while he goes in and unties her. However, soon after he enters the aircraft, he locks Kirkpatrick out, starts up the plane, and heads for the runway, having decided to leave Kirkpatrick to the wolves. Moments later, Friday and Streebek show up and try to chase after Whirley, but they are too late to stop him from flying away. Thankfully, Whirley does not get too far; in the morning, Friday comes flying in alongside him in an LAPD fighter jet and orders him to make a landing. With no means of fighting back, Whirley has no choice but to surrender, so he lands at the nearest airport and gets placed under arrest. After Friday get back on the ground, he and Connie meet up, and she tells him that she is so proud of him. They then move in for a kiss, but they are interrupted by Streebek, who congratulates himself and Joe on the collar. After sending Streebek off, Friday drives Connie back home.

Whirley is next shown wearing a prison uniform and staring at the camera, and the narrator informs us that he was tried in court and found guilty on two counts of attempted murder, kidnapping, arson, obstruction of justice, and tampering with public utilities. He is presently in the Chino Correctional Facility serving 43 consecutive 99-year sentences, which makes him eligible for parole in seven years (nothing is revealed about what became of Kirkpatrick, but it is safe to assume that she was arrested and imprisoned herself). The morning after taking Whirley and his associates down, Friday and Streebek meet up outside LAPD headquarters for another day of police work, and as they start walking up the stairs towards the front door, Streebek remarks to Friday that he looks tired. Friday informs Streebek that he spent a quiet evening in the company of Connie Swail, and when Streebek points out that he didn’t preface her name with “The Virgin” this time, Friday silently casts him a look that says that, thanks to him, she isn’t a virgin anymore (and neither is he).