Helpless Help

1-21-2015
We've just published a new Short Story, and Coco has some background info on it:
Years and years ago, I saw a movie with Beau Bridges (I think), as the hero. It was a kind of thriller: I really can't remember the story, or the title. What I DO remember though, is the end scene. It took place at a building site, very high up. Beau found himself battling the bad guy, and his love interest was also there, as a classic damsel in distress, wearing a straight jacket. ( I told you, this was years ago; in this day and age, Beau would probably be wearing the jacket, watching his girl fight of five construction workers all on her own, while making demeaning remarks about the male gender as a whole and... well, that's a rant for another day).

Anyway, He defeats his opponent, and all seems well that ends well. But then, as a last thriller element, he slips, and almost falls from this very, very high floor, clinging on to the concrete by his fingernails! And of course, his heroin rushes forward to help him and... she can't do anything! She can only stand there, bent over, shouting to him, while he's hanging there, facing this tremendous peril. The thing is of course, that in this case, her impotence is so accentuated by her partial freedom. It would have been so much less dramatic, had she been tied to a pole, or something like that. It is the 'so close and yet so far'element, I guess, that made the scene so exciting.

I have tried to capture a bit of that helplessness in a small element of this short story, in this little silhouette here. Also, I have from time to time used similar situations on other occasions.

CBAP

One of our members came up with the name of the movie: SEVEN HOURS TO JUDGMENT (1988)
The hero was indeed Beau Bridges, who was also the director, the girl in the jacket was Julianne Phillips.
Thank you very much!