TIGHTROPE: The Story 11: Wes Block vs. Harry Callahan

[mgk]

By the time Tightrope was filmed, Eastwood was closely associated with the role of Harry Callahan, having portrayed the character in four films, the most recent (Sudden Impact) released only a year before Tightrope. With the character of Wes Block, Eastwood would portray a different type of cop. Discuss how Wes Block and Harry Callahan are different, and how they are similar.

[Philo Beddoe Jr]

Differences

Wes Block is very different from Harry.

Harry would not have been into the prostitution scene at all. 

Wes has moved up the police food chain too, wheras Harry's renegade style has not been conducive to higher offices.

WKC.

[Walt]

The only similarity I can see is their chosen profession .
That and the fact that they look alike   

[Americanbeauty]

Differences:

- Wes' got a family, children, Harry hasn't

- Wes only uses his gun twice in the movie (once in the warehouse and once when the killer breaks into his house), whereas the 44 Magnum is Harry's 'best friend'

- prostitutes, hanging out in bars and clubs, Wes' weaknesses.
It doesn't look like Harry ...

- Harry is a rebel, much more defiant and arrogant than Wes  towards figures of authority.
Wes would be more the "I do what I'm told" kind of cop (not as much as Shockley in The Gauntlet of course but between Shockley and Harry)
I think it has to do with the fact that Harry's got nothing to lose, but Wes has 2 kids and he can't take the risk of getting a suspension.



Similarities:

- they are both very private men, don't get close to anyone easily, don't confide easily

- they both have lost their wife (Wes is divorced and Harry's wife was killed in a car accident)

- they have this 'dark side', it's hard to explain but you have the feeling that no matter how close you get to them, there will always remain a part of mystery.
In Tightrope the proof is Amanda's questionning her father "where did you go tonight ?", he answers "'had to look for something...". She insists "did you find it ?", and he simply evades the question "I found out one thing, that you should be in bed getting some sleep."
In Dirty Harry you can feel it too in the scene where they discover Ann Mary Deacon.
It's very hard to tell what's on their mind

- ambiguity.
On one Dirty Harry poster the tagline said "Dirty Harry and the homicidal maniac. Harry's the one with the badge".
In Tightrope, Wes has this dream where HE is the killer, and of course the movie plays on this ambiguity + the half shadow on the poster.

- there's a certain sadness about them.
Callahan in Dirty Harry in this scene where they discover Scorpio's young victim, and Wes getting drunk, looking at a picture of the family before the divorce.
Wes realizes that the crazies "are always out"
Harry throws away his badge at the end, a sign of his loss of faith in the system

- they both take commitments very seriously, either to their family (Wes doing his best to be a good father) or to their job (Harry defending the rights of the victims, Wes confronting his inner fears to get Rolfe, doing his job even if the case becomes very personal)

- they both have a sense of humor

- no real known friends outside the police force

- they get the guy in the end

[Philo Beddoe Jr]

As we have observed, unlike Wes, Harry didn't go for the seedy scene. 
Here is a nice lobby card of Harry's encounter with the pornographer in The Enforcer

[vik]

i don't think harry has a dark side and he is more humerous than wes - and i think he would have approached the case differently

i think harry would have solved the case quicker and wouldn't have been drawn in like wes

but i think thats whats so nice its not harry - this guy is more vunerable in different ways - somehow you somethimes lose the cop feel to tightrope - the ambuiguity is stronger between human and cop - you can see him throwing in his badge quicker than harry and for different reasons - not so much the system - but for his sanity and family

[dane with no name]

i don't think harry has a dark side and he is more humerous than wes

Harry has a dark side, it´s the charming Hary demeanor he shows of to the world all the time 

[Lin.]

Both Callahan and Block are private men but we do get to see into the private life of Block.  Callahan's could be equally as perverse. We never really see that side of Harry. There are just hints as to his private life.  Callahan is a cop first and formost.  The complexity of Block can make you feel you don't know him at all.  OK so they are both cops but so different in their approaches to the law.  Neither are bent but both of them handle the law recklessly to obtain a result. They move in different worlds, Harry's quarry tend to be criminals on the outside, whereas Wes's are in the underworld. If you can see what I mean.  Scorpio and Rolfe seem to be killing to anger and torment Harry and Wes but in such diverse ways.   Comparision between the two is difficult  you need to take away the fact that Clint is playing both of them.

[Lilly]

Wes only uses his gun twice in the movie (once in the warehouse and once when the killer breaks into his house), whereas the 44 Magnum is Harry's 'best friend'

Yes.  It seems a conscious effort was made to distinguish Wes from Harry.  I don't know what make of gun Wes uses (I'm sure someone here can tell me ), but the barrel is significantly shorter than Callahan's.  Block is clearly not intended to be the all-powerful shooter.

In fact, we never see Wes fire his gun.  We only ever hear two shots discharged from it, while the camera is on the faces of the kids in the closet.  For all we know, Rolfe could have fired them.  But the assumption is that Block fired, and missed, or at best lightly wounded Rolfe, because he gets away.  That ain't no Dirty Harry.

[Brendan]

Thanks to everyone for participating in this discussion. This topic is now closed, please post any additional thoughts in the General Discussion forum.