DOWNTOWN

McBain lays off the 87th Precinct for a zany Christmas adventure that takes off like a nuclear-powered roller coaster: hick Florida orange-grower Michael Barnes, looking to catch the last plane out of Manhattan after a business trip, gets hustled by a pair of sharpies, then, minus his driver's license, turns his car over to a movie producer who ditches him and drives it away, and then, leaving the police station where he's reported his bad luck, gets held up by a masked Chinese gunman who leads him, when they're both chased by a police officer in lingerie (don't ask), to a high-stakes crapshoot. Just when you're figuring this for a remake of The Out-of-Towners and Blind Date (two of the few movies McBain doesn't refer to directly sooner or later), Michael hears that the movie producer's been found dead in Michael's rented car, along with Michael's wallet and ID- -except, as Michael and gorgeous chauffeur Connie Kee find out, it isn't really the movie producer at all, but the little man in a humongous drug-ring they'd better look into if they're going to keep Michael (instantly famous from the late-night TV news) out of stir. Ramshackle plotting toward the end, as usual with recent McBains, but still slick and professionally funny—a real grabber.