Cape Fear sucked!

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I wont say Cape Fear “sucks” because, as I put it in another post on that board, I found it frightful as the title implies it is.
As a general rule, I don’t like horror movies, because I find they are a waste of my time. I have two reasons for thinking that, one very personal, the other quite rational. As a kid, I camped with my parents by the side of a mountain lake – no kidding. It was near the Serre-Ponçon Dam, in the Alps. The place is savage and beautiful, and there is a village that has been flooded when the dam was created. Creepy:-) One night, we were treated with a show of “the thing from outer space”, black and white. For the rest of the summer, my parents couldn’t sleep as I was just turned wild after seeing it. (later, I was forbidden “E.T.” in retaliation!) I remember I was offered a ride on a pony in exchange for some peace, and mom was bitter enough to mention the fact that before I was born, she took-up horse riding in the secret hope of a miscarrying… It had been a very wild summer for everybody. Home, despite the fact there was solid walls around and no more mere trailer bulkheads, I couldn’t bare darkness neither. With time, it came to the point I got very depressed, till one day, as granny had sent me to the basement to get something, I decided that it would be more simple to have all my blood sucked by a vampire than to go on with that circus. So I didn’t put on the light, fetched whatever grandma wanted, and got upstairs and it was over.
On the other hand, one of my friend took me to watch “scream” and I was real cross when out of the theater. This IS something “sucking”, for it was sold as a comedy, only there is no humor in it, only irony. The first one is a bridge between people, the latter separates them like a repulsive fence. I don’t go and watch repulsion.

As I wrote in a post on that board, I rented Cape Fear to have a look at another G. Peck movie in comparison of Duel in the Sun (1946). Cape Fear was the one available by that time. It is a coincidence that I watched both, but it seems that the philosophical grounds of both films are the same and very old. I invite you to see my comment of Duel in the sun about it. (Incidentally, that was the first movie that impressed Mr Martin Scorcese, I think the man did movies in the Cape Fear style). I assume that the choice in the male lead in 1961 was not innocent, as the character Mr Peck plays is not so different from the one of the 1946 movie. Intelligent and socially established Councilor Bowden behaves aggressively. Females are the helpless ones in his macho mind. Far worse, they are preys in predatory Caddy’s hand. Here lies the basic duel between the two men. In the beginning, Bowden doesn’t make difference between people and between him and people – of the same sex or not: whatever macho, to him, people are people. Caddy treats others as specimen of a different specie.
When Bowden doesn’t kill his opponent in the end, one might think he still knows the difference of wrong from right. But his speech shows he mightn’t. When he has lost any self-respect and really want to have Caddy caged as an animal, or only tries to impress the fellow that might think himself an animal is left for the audience to decide. See, “ironisein” means “to ask” in Greek. I don’t like to be left with questions by a movie, for I watch movies for comfort.
About the remake I have not seen, I gather that “violent” -that is, aggressive, Caddy instead of predatory can explain why one would like it better. Aggressivity is said to be a matter of seduction, and seduction is comforting when freely consented.

As a matter of fact, would I had seen the movie 3 years ago, I think I would have rejoiced in Bowden final “victory”, without any second thoughts about the whole story. But by then, I have been reminded a nasty encounter of my teenage time I never discussed with anyone before I incidentally talked about it with my aunt, and things she said about it were exactly the opposite to things my dad told me when I asked him when I was recalling the thing right or not. The events I recalled ok, but now the way my parents reacted –not calling the police because there was no way of getting the man according to them- let me wonder when they realized what I had been subjected to or when I was not that important for them, or else.
And, well, I have been mugged on the 2005 the 26th of December by a guy who flew only with my hand bag handles as I resisted – but I have very big doubts about my fellow citizen when I think about the way people reacted to my bawling “au voleur” like a hog, so it might just be me being doubtful about outcomes in a general kind of way when I say “cape fear” 61 doesn’t suck but delivers exactly what’s on the package.
It is scary to me, though I didn’t watched it on that intent.
Truly,
em

so not true! the first whooooooooops the 2nd ones ass! better acting, better EVERYTHING!
get over it, just because the 92 version is newer doesn't make it better

This always comes up with the younger crowd who have been raised on over-the-top sex, violence, car chases, etc. -- to the point that they just don't feel entertained without the gratuitous crud we find in damn near every newer film

You're perfectly welcome to your opinion, but eventually your appreciation for film may mature past the machine-guns-and-bouncy-silicone-tits level.

Mitchum's sense of menace and danger was done solely with acting and didn't depend on wild tattoos or drooling, thug-like behavior. It was far more subtle and required far more talent than DeNiro's. I liked DeNiro's version and have watched it several times. It's excellent, fast-paced and totally enjoyable. It's also more of the video-game approach to action films, and doesn't really rely on acting nearly as much.

In some ways it's unfair to compare the two since they took different approaches. But expecting the original version to fit some kid's idea of a exciting, slam-bang action movie is just unreasonable. They could have done that but deliberately took a more subtle, cerebral approach to depicting terror and menace, and if you can't appreciate that it's probably because of age, exposure to movies made before computer graphics, and perhaps needing to take a higher dose of Ritalin.

Calm down, relax and enjoy. You might even like it ... someday.

To me the '91 version was like a typical scare movie, where the monster gets shot or something and keeps coming back...and coming back, etc. The '62 version had Peck (Yaaaay) AND Mitchum (Yaaaay). Though De Niro was really good I have to pick the original as the best overall movie.

BobbyBB..............you're too dumb to live!