Cape Fear
Dir: Martin Scorsese
1991
****
Remaking Cape Fear was always going to be a brave move, even for a director as talented as Martin Scorsese. As remakes go, it's pretty good - bringing the story into the 90s effortlessly and without much problem. The cast is well chosen, De Niro is particularly good as Max Cady, the character made famous by Robert Mitchum in the original. Indeed, the coup of this film is in getting Mitchum and Peck back for a couple of cameos - good cameos at that. In fact all the cast do a great job apart from Jessica Lange. What Scorsese really adds to the story is the fact that the most disturbing factor is that the family is just as unlikable as the bad guy, so you start to wonder about the justice involved, even though you know very well that it's wrong. The theatre scene makes the skin crawl, something of an improvement on the original but overall you can't beat the '62 version. The music is also very impressive.