Harry & Son is a 1984 American drama film directed by Paul Newman, who also stars. The screenplay by Newman and Ronald Buck focuses on the relationship between a blue-collar worker and his son (Robby Benson), who fails at various odd jobs while aspiring to be a writer. Joanne Woodward, Ellen Barkin, Ossie Davis, Wilford Brimley, and Judith Ivey also star. The film also features Morgan Freeman in an early role.

Detailed Plot

Widower Harry Keach is a construction worker in South Florida, who was raised to appreciate the importance of working for a living. He takes a dim view of his sensitive son Howard's lackadaisical and sometimes hedonistic lifestyle, in his early 20s and devoted to a dead-end, part-time job, surfing, chasing girls, and hot-tubbing while he dreams of becoming the next Ernest Hemingway. Harry also has a strained relationship with his daughter Nina because he dislikes her husband, an insurance salesman, and he thinks Nina has become stuck up now that she has married a more affluent man.

When intense headaches and impaired vision cause Harry to lose control of the wrecking ball on his crane, he loses his job. His unemployment leaves him feeling frustrated, although he refuses to work in his brother Tom's military-surplus store. He becomes increasingly angry at Howard for quitting jobs at a car wash and with an auto-repossession outfit and threatens to throw his son out of the house.

Harry spends some of his free time visiting his widowed neighbor Lilly, a pet-store owner who was good friends with his deceased wife, and has loved Harry for years. Her daughter Katie, a former high-school girlfriend of Howard's with whom he broke up due to rumors of her being promiscuous, is now pregnant with another man's child. After being abandoned by her lover, Katie's relationship with Howard rekindles. He is resisting the advances of a nymphomaniacal older woman, Sally, but eventually introduces her to Harry.

Howard succeeds in selling a short story, much to his father's amazement. He uses some of the money to finance a vacation for Harry, Lilly, Katie, and her newborn baby (also called Harry). Harry begins to experience happiness at last, until tragedy strikes.