In Nice Dreams (1981), Cheech & Chong play pot dealers who use an ice cream truck as a front for their business. Though they plan on retiring to the Bahamas, Sgt. Stedanko (Stacy Keach reprising his Up in Smoke role) is hot on their trail, although he's been smoking weed himself, and is slowly turning into a lizard.
Under the influence of cocaine, Chong signs all of the duo's money to Howie the Hamburger Dude (Paul Reubens), leading the duo to break into the mental institution to get their money back, and they meet Timothy Leary, who gives them LSD. Cheech and Chong also attempt a threesome with Cheech's ex-girlfriend, Donna. In the end, Cheech and Chong end up as male strippers after their weed connection is busted.
Dialogue from Paul Reubens' scenes appeared in the Primus song "Hamburger Train", while the ice cream truck was imitated in the Afroman music video "Because I Got High", with the Clown's head from this movie replaced by Afroman's head.
Nice Dreams provides examples of the following tropes:
- Call-Back: Donna reappears from Cheech and Chong's Next Movie. Stedanko reappears from Up in Smoke, though Cheech and Chong are playing different characters.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Whenever Detectives Drooler and Noodles are at the police station, Noodles always focuses his attention to the hookers being questioned by the police.
- At one point, a police helicopter flies over a nude beach, with the cops focusing on the topless women.
- Erudite Stoner: Chong
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Inverted when Drooler and Noodles wear blonde women's wigs and trick Cheech and Chong into accepting a ride with them. Their disguise is just the wigs (with Noodles putting his hand over his mustache), but Cheech is unsure whether they were men or women. Still, despite them wearing the wigs, Noodles decides to make a move on Drooler, who is uncomfortable.
- Police Are Useless: The cops in this movie are highly stupid, except for Stedanko, who isn't too useful, either, since he ends up smoking a genetically modified strain of marijuana which turns him into a lizard.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Though he's only in one scene and not the main villain of the film, Donna's ex-boyfriend Animal is this. His wanted poster notes that he hates Mexicans.
- The Pornomancer: Cheech
- Stoners Are Funny
- Stoner Flick
- The Voiceless: Detective Noodles never has only dialogue, and the only time his voice is heard is when he's laughing when watching Cheech, Chong, and Donna with his binoculars. After the two detectives wear women's wigs and give Cheech and Chong a ride, Detective Drooler tells Noodles that that was a good idea he had, implying he told him the idea.
