The Pink Panther's First Case

The Pink Panther's First Case is a 1984 British comedy film and a continuation of The Pink Panther series of films started by Blake Edwards in the early 1960s. There is a new lead, Ted Wass, as bumbling American detective Clifton Sleigh.

Plot
Princess Yasmin of Lugash (Debrah Farentino) is abducted on a yatch outside of New York City by terrorists led by a mercenary named Hans (Robert Davi) in order to force her father to abdicate and allow her disgraced stepmother's lover, a military general with terrorist ties to an unfriendly neighboring kingdom, to claim the throne. NYPD Lieutenant Palmyra (Pat Corley) works with the FBI to solve the case of the kidnapped princess. The FBI demands that Sleigh take part in their joint task force since he is hailed as 'The World's Greatest Detective' while being unaware that Sleigh is a bumbling idiot whom Palmyra tricked into doing traffic duty, which he considers to be as a part of a top secret assignment.

While Palmyra investigates her disappearance, he has a run-in with the kidnappers and Sleigh (Ted Wass). Sleigh opens the rear doors of the kidnapper's van and unknowingly spies the Princess who he believes is the driver's sister en route to the hospital.

Hans becomes aware that Sleigh witnessed the Princess in the back of his van and sends his henchmen to kill Sleigh as a routine precaution. Palmyra follows Sleigh to the hospital where he observes Sleigh's bumbling antics with stumbling around as well as getting his bicycle stuck in a wet cement sidewalk outside the hospital. When Hans' henchmen arrive and chase after Sleigh on his bicycle, Palmyra intervenes and saves the klutzy policeman. He takes Sleigh to his apartment to inform him about what has happened to the princess. Han's men attempt to plant a bomb in Sleigh's apartment, however, it leads to Palmyra becoming injured instead and sent to the hospital.

While in the hospital, Palmyra assigns Sleigh to help rescue Princess Yasmin and the FBI is grateful for Sleigh being involved because without that, they would not have known that Yasmin was still in New York City. Sleigh recognizes one of Hans' henchmen at the hospital who is inquiring about a doctor for Hans who is injured after Yasmin had attempted to escape. Impersonating a doctor, Sleigh gains access to Hans hideout and clumsy attempts to treat the injured Hans, who soon sees through Sleigh's charade and has him locked up with the princess.

Sleigh decides to move his safe house out of New York City and to Lugash, and sends his men to kill Sleigh by placing him in a van and rolling it down a steep road off a cliff, but Sleigh manages to escape. Seeking help, Sleigh and his partner Detective Ed Milton (Bubba Smith) travel to Paris to meet Clouseau's former costumer Professor Auguste Balls (Graham Stark) to assist them in making new disguises for themselves to travel to Lugash to rescue Princess Yasmin. Sleigh and Milton fly to Lugash where they meet a government agent at a local restaurant to point them the location of Hans' new hideout.

While being followed by the Lugash Army, as well as Milton, Sleigh breaks into a castle located outside the Lugash capital city where in a climatic gun battle, Sleigh gains access to the castle with the assistance of the army and after confronting Hans and his henchmen, defeats them, with a little of Milton's help and rescues Princess Yasmin.

The final scene has Sergeant Sleigh attending a ceremony in Lugash attended by King Haroak and Princess Yasmin who award him with a special medal for his rescue of Yasmin which is attended by Palmyra, Charlie, Milton, and Prof. Balls where Sleigh's clumsy antics disrupt the proceedings just like Inspector Clouseau's antics used to do in previous Pink Panther films. Sleigh closes the film with the line: "That felt good!" following by the image of Sleigh freezing as the animated Pink Panther walks across the still of Clifton, until an animated Sleigh suddenly cuts away the head of live-action Sleigh and pops out of the hole, dropping the head on the Panther's foot; the enraged Panther chases him into fading blackness.

Cast

 * Ted Wass as Sergeant Clifton Sleigh
 * Bubba Smith as Detective Ed Milton
 * Pat Corley as Lt. Palmyra
 * Joe Morton as Charlie
 * Debrah Farentino as Princess Yasmin
 * Jennifer Edwards as Yussa
 * Robert Davi as Hans Zarba
 * Mark Schneider as Arnon
 * Mike Starr as Hanif
 * Kenny Spalding as Garth
 * Graham Stark as Professor Auguste Balls
 * Oliver Cotton as King Haroak
 * Shabana Azmi as Queen
 * Aharon Ipalé as Gen. Jaffar
 * Billy Dee Williams as Agent Ryder