Cape Fear (1991)
Sam Bowden is a small-town corporate attorney. Max Cady is a tattooed, cigar-smoking, Bible-quoting, psychotic rapist. What do they have in common? 14 years ago, Sam was a public defender assigned to Max Cady's rape trial, and he made a serious error: he hid a document from his illiterate client that could have gotten him acquitted. Now, the cagey Cady has been released, and he intends to teach Sam Bowden and his family a thing or two about loss.
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Very disappointed :(
It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.
This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.
Good movie/ great acting. I can see where alot of ideas that gave birth to Natural Born Killers came from. I loved Dirty Grandpa, I caught 4 to 5 scenes very close to in the movie.
This is how Scorsese follows up Goodfellas? Shame on him. It's so bad... I remember back then Scorsese said that DeNiro talked him into making this movie. Well Martin, if Robert was going to jump off a bridge...? Come on, friendship only goes so far. The script is just so dumb. Scorsese was doomed from the start. What's really shocking is that he managed to get pretty bad performances from this usually rock solid cast. The only ones that came off well are Peck and Mitchum (sorry Joe Don). He takes the great (and sexy) Jessica Lange and turns her a shrill, screaming annoyance. Nolte, strong movie bad ass, is turned into a weak (most of the time), dumb (almost all the time) movie bad ass. And legendary DeNiro is somehow over-the-top and uninteresting at the same time. He only has one really good scene. His accent alternates from okay to silly but always remains distracting. The movie is also too mean. I'm fine with violence in movies (only) but meanness is a huge turn off. I don't like having my nose rubbed in it. On the bright side, the last half hour or so is laugh out loud bad. Unbelievably bad considering the giant talents involved in this one. I don't remember how I felt about it 27 years ago. I think it wasn't one of my favorites but I don't remember thinking it was that bad. But now, wow, it's a borderline camp classic.
Scorsese's career has been one where there have been many ups and downs in the quality of his films. But I thought he hit it out of the park with Cape Fear, and I thought it was the best film of 1991, as well as one of the scarier pictures I have ever seen. I know people in 1991 went crazy over The Silence of the Lambs, but I thought Cape Fear was far superior to this.I'll be the first to say that the De Niro character was at times a bit over-the-top, and was portrayed in a near super-human way at times, which stretched credulity. Nevertheless, there were so many good things about this movie that I was able to overlook that. Juliette Lewis was great in one of her first major film roles as the free-spirited daughter of Nick Nolte and Jessica Lange, and definitely deserved the Oscar nomination that she received.
Disturbed rapist Max Cady (Robert De Niro) is released from prison after 14 years. He starts hounding lawyer Sam Bowden (Nick Nolte), his wife Leigh (Jessica Lange) and daughter Danielle (Juliette Lewis). Cady reminds Bowden that he was his original public defense lawyer. He blames Bowden for his conviction. Bowden buried a report that the victim was promiscuous. Cady attacks Sam's friend Lori Davis (Illeana Douglas). Lt. Elgart (Robert Mitchum) can't arrest him because Lori is too afraid to press charges. Bowden hires private detective Tom Broadbent (Fred Dalton Thompson).Director Martin Scorsese is using all his Hitchcockian Brian De Palma skills. Some of the scenes have great tension. De Niro and Lewis in the school is amazing. De Niro is great throughout. The style and the great actors combine to make something more than a simple remake of the original.