It is about a pair of United States Navy shore patrollers (SPs) (Tom Berenger and William McNamara) who must escort a beautiful prisoner (Erika Eleniak), and the troubles they encounter.

Eddie Devane is a young sailor who has carried out a number of inventory-related scams along with his partner-in-crime Howard and made a lot of money during his service.

A day before his discharge, Eddie is assigned to escort a prisoner from the Marine Corps Base at Camp Lejeune along with the authoritarian, no-nonsense Chief Petty Officer Rock Reilly.

They converse and bond in a diner where it is revealed that Rock is divorced from his wife and estranged from his son, and Toni had first gone AWOL to visit her delinquent, drug-addicted brother in a hospital.

While giving her chase, Eddie and Rock's van accidentally climbs up an artificial volcano in an amusement park and falls down but they both escape unhurt.

In the epilogue set one year later, Eddie and Toni are living it up "somewhere south of the border," and Rock, now retired from the Navy, has begun a relationship with a waitress he met at the diner before.

[2] Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times praised Hopper for delivering a "rip-roaring comic adventure" for his three main leads to sink their teeth into and the writing team for providing him a "deft mix of slapstick, sharp repartee and sentiment" in the script, concluding that: "There's a lot of screwball humor in Chasers' classically amoral plot, yet adding to the film's freshness is that visually it's an affectionate running commentary on the amusing tackiness of roadside Americana.

"[3] The New York Times' Janet Maslin praised the performances of Berenger, McNamara and Eleniak for rising above the film's unbelievable plot and "cheesecake" qualities of their roles and the colorful aspects of the supporting cast, concluding that: "These characters aren't really connected, but Mr. Hopper's imprint is strong enough to turn them all into kindred spirits.