Tightrope (1984)

Not a Dirty Harry Movie #2

Synopsis: Pervy Harry

Blurb From the VHS Jacket: “Two men, lured by the promise of kinky sex, prowl the steamy streets of New Orleans' French Quarter. One is a cop. The other is a killer. Clint Eastwood stars as Wes Block, a cop teetering on a Tightrope that separates the man he strives to be from the man he fears he is.”

What Did I Learn?: Telling a woman you would like to lick the sweat off her back will get you into her pants, every time.

You Might Like This Movie If: You know that if you ever find yourself teetering on a tightrope, you probably need some professional help.

Really?: 1) See “What Did I Learn?”. 2) What does Block have against calling for backup? Good Lord, the killer invades his home, and Block orders his daughters to hide in the closet, instead of...oh, I don’t know – CALLING THE COPS? Same thing when he discovers the killer is knocking off his girlfriend’s bodyguards; Does he report this to the police station? Noooooooo...he just speeds towards her house and hopes he makes it there in the nick of time. 3) So wait – Block busted the killer 11 years earlier? Wouldn’t he notice the guy’s name on list of Dixie Brewery employees? Isn’t it a stretch for him to follow a hunch, based on an old newspaper clipping? 4) If the killer is nursing a grudge against Block, why doesn’t he go after him and his family instead of wasting all that time killing prostitutes?

Rating: Tightrope is not one of Clint Eastwood’s better cop movies. It’s far too slow, there’s almost no action until near the end, the scenes of the prostitutes getting murdered are pointless and trashy, and Clint seems far too busy getting his knob polished to do any real detective work. And why cover the killers’s face with a series of masks if he’s a nobody to the audience? Since the movie deals with the duality between the killer’s desires and Block’s libido, I’m surprised nobody considered either making Eastwood the murderer, or at least letting the audience wonder if it might be him. Unfortunately, Tightrope is simply a forgettable, and by-the-numbers serial killer thriller. 6/10 stars.  

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088272/