"He penetrated her vaginally and anally"

Tightrope (Richard Tuggle,1984)


Clint Eastwood sleeping with dogs, getting blowjobs from prostitutes and having to track down a serial killer that likes to wear oriental themed masks and commits murders in his Puma Sneakers. Yes, this film has it all and surprisingly it's really good. Tightrope is a film that seems like a bizarre throwback to cop flicks and film noirs but still feels like it's in it's own little world.

The set up is simple, Wes Block (Clint Eastwood) has to track down who's been killing prostitutes in his neighborhood. A very simple premise that has been done a million times before. The only thing that makes this film different is that it is driven by character. It's not just a normal guy out on the lookout for a killer. The protagonist and the antagonist actually have the same characteristics. Both Wes Block and the mysterious killer are fueled by sex. The character that we're suppose to feel safe with even makes us sick, a divorce cop that has two children and goes out to have sex with prostitutes. Something that hasn't been done in this genre before and it's actually refreshing. We get to see this character change from the beginning of the film to the end and it's amazing even with all the weird off beat things that are going on.

I had no idea what i was in store when i started watching this film. I was actually going to see "Escape from Alcatraz" (another Eastwood film) but this one caught my eye. I'm not really sure why it did but i just picked this one up instead. I'm really glad to have chosen this one also because this seems to be a very under appreciated film. Everyone seemed to be all hopped up on Dirty Harry to give this one a chance. The Dirty Harry films are great fun but the character is pretty one sided, just a bad ass with a gun. Very few films actually have the brains to do something like this and with the insane context of the film, it shouldn't work at all but yet it does.

On a side note, the heading of this little write up is actually in the film. Yes, this film is pretty awesome.

Grade A-