Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

After watching first The Night of the Hunter (1955) and now Cape Fear, I get the impression Robert Mitchum was one bad a$$. I imagine he woke up to shots of whiskey and spent his days gambling at the track with loose women. I base this opinion wholly on the characters he played in the aforementioned films, seven years apart.

I hardly recognized him when he first came on the screen as Max Cady. He cut a dashing figure in The Night of the Hunter, with his good looks and odd charm (for a maniac serial killer that is), but he looked a bit older, a bit more rugged in Cape Fear. He sits in a courtroom where our soon to become hero, Gregory Peck as Sam Bowden, is practicing law in idyllic, small-town America.

And so the story begins… And we soon learn that Sam Bowden was the star witness in the trial of Max Cady, a man accused of an attack on a woman. Bowden’s testimony sends Cady to prison for eight long years - eight years spent brooding and planning his revenge on the woman and her rescuer.

Cady begins stalking Bowden and his family who live in a sort of Leave It To Beaver syrupy sweet world. Bowden is a successful, good-looking attorney who spends his weekends with his family, fixing up a boat. His wife is beautiful in pearls and high heels, the daughter is sweet and cute and following in mom’s footsteps. You couldn’t imagine a more perfect life - until Max Cady comes along and begins threatening to rape his young daughter.

What really struck me about the movie and still kind of leaves a lump in my throat now is the harsh reality of rape. In the film, Cady threatens and beats one of his victims so badly, she is terrified to testify against him and leaves town rather than face his wrath. I thought the actress who played this relatively small role was outstanding - the scene is very moving and all at once, disturbing. The movie has a very creepy air to it - even though most of the violence and terror is implied.

If you’re tired or not paying attention (like my husband was on his first attempt to watch it), you might not even realize the antagonist is a rapist. I think they actually only use the word “rape” twice. As I’m learning with each older film I watch, gore and overt violence are never really as creepy as what the mind comes up with when left to its own devices. Cape Fear is exemplary of that very notion with its restrained dark tone.

Now, as I eluded to earlier, Max Cady ain’t no sissy boy and you get some nerve gripping fight scenes in here as well. Tension runs high in this stalker movie with its sometimes jarring camera work and nod to Alfred Hitchcock.

My advice to you when watching this movie: Don’t think too hard about the plot. Thinking too hard about the plot will only make you realize that some of the fundamentals in this film are just plain silly or completely exasperating maybe. For example, Cady not only planned sweet, sweet revenge sitting in the clink for eight years, he was also a prodigal law student, or so it would seem. Why, pray tell? So that he could find every possible legal loophole to harass Bowden and his family without them having any sort of recourse what so ever.

Any action Bowden takes to protect himself or his family, is challenged by a slick lawyer hired by Cady. "You know the type, Sam. Slap a cigarette out of some hoodlum's mouth and he's down here hollering about police brutality!” says the police chief and family friend of the Bowden’s. Everything is interpreted as being an infraction of the serial rapist’s civil rights, everything leads to threats of the distraught Bowden being in danger of being disbarred.

Another downfall, for me, is that when the movie reaches its final climatic moments, I’m thinking to myself, “Alright, this is from 1962, it has Gregory Peck in it. I pretty much know how it is going to end…”. Maybe it is wrong of me to think that way (especially since I know nary a thing about Gregory Peck), but my preconceptions were correct. Because of my mindset, it probably wasn’t as suspenseful as it could have been and I certainly wasn’t as scared as I should have been. Maybe it was the time, maybe it’s the fact that I just watched Dahmer last week, I don’t know, but this shocker didn’t shock me much with its ending.

Minor complaints aside, this was a pretty great movie touching on a subject that seems to have been swept under the rug in those days, lest the woman be humiliated further. Robert Mitchum turns in a stellar performance as the hard, twisted Max Cady, one of the most convincing screen villains I have ever seen. Gregory Peck is excellent as the concerned father and family man, becoming more and more harried as the film evolves.


Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older