Cape Fear
Cape Fear is a grown up suspense film. I'm talking about the original 1962 version starring Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum, not some remake with a psycho tattooed Robert De Niro.
Anyway, it's pretty darn entertaining and suspenseful film. Peck plays Sam Bowden, a lawyer in some small southern town, who years before was witness to a crime (in Baltimore!) committed by Max Cady (Mitchum). Cady is out of prison, and he's not very happy with Bowden, who he thinks ruined his life after his wife left him while he was in prison. Cady used his time in prison to his advantage, and he's become quite the jailhouse lawyer. Bowden recognizes the threat right away, and gets his police chief friend involved to run Cady out of town, but it doesn't work.
The whole movie is incredibly suspenseful, and Cady is very menancing. I wouldn't want him near me or my family! After taking much of Cady's menancing (and after he poisons the family dog), Bowden finally uses his wife and daughter as bait to lure Cady up to a houseboat on Cape Fear. He takes the bait, and chases after the wife at first, but then switches tactics to go after the daughter. Will he abuse the young daughter before Bowden can get to him?
The music is fantastic in the movie -- Bernard Herrmann is excellent, as usual. Telly Savalas shows up as a private detective and actually has hair. And Martin Balsam, best known to me from Psycho is the police chief trying to help Bowden get Cady out of town.
It's hard to judge this movie, especially based on movie standards now. I kept expecting something more to happen, more blood, more violence. It was refreshing for me to watch a movie which was still be very suspenseful but yet it didn't go over the boundries of "good taste."
Anyway, it's pretty darn entertaining and suspenseful film. Peck plays Sam Bowden, a lawyer in some small southern town, who years before was witness to a crime (in Baltimore!) committed by Max Cady (Mitchum). Cady is out of prison, and he's not very happy with Bowden, who he thinks ruined his life after his wife left him while he was in prison. Cady used his time in prison to his advantage, and he's become quite the jailhouse lawyer. Bowden recognizes the threat right away, and gets his police chief friend involved to run Cady out of town, but it doesn't work.
The whole movie is incredibly suspenseful, and Cady is very menancing. I wouldn't want him near me or my family! After taking much of Cady's menancing (and after he poisons the family dog), Bowden finally uses his wife and daughter as bait to lure Cady up to a houseboat on Cape Fear. He takes the bait, and chases after the wife at first, but then switches tactics to go after the daughter. Will he abuse the young daughter before Bowden can get to him?
The music is fantastic in the movie -- Bernard Herrmann is excellent, as usual. Telly Savalas shows up as a private detective and actually has hair. And Martin Balsam, best known to me from Psycho is the police chief trying to help Bowden get Cady out of town.
It's hard to judge this movie, especially based on movie standards now. I kept expecting something more to happen, more blood, more violence. It was refreshing for me to watch a movie which was still be very suspenseful but yet it didn't go over the boundries of "good taste."
posted by Rebecca at 1:33 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home