‚Cape Fear‘ and Pop Cultural Eternal Return

Every generation gets the “Cape Fear” remake they deserve. The 1962 version of the film starred Robert Mitchum as Max Caddy, a psychotic ex-con on a rampage of revenge against the attorney (played by Gregory Peck) who put him in jail. Mitchum’s Cady is slimy, bitter, and increasingly dangerous as the movie progresses—he moves through its climactic setpiece with the tensed silence of an apex predator. He even fills the talky scenes with dark energy, helped in large part by director J. Lee Thompson giving him ample space to work:

Then you have the 1991 remake, with Mitchum replaced by Robert De Niro. In the intervening 29 years, many of the restrictions around onscreen sex and violence had fallen away, which meant that Martin Scorsese, in the director’s chair, could indulge the most intense of his Grand Guignol instincts. This didn’t improve the final product, which is splattery and scream-y but not particularly tense or scary. Whereas Mitchum was tightly coiled rage, De Niro plays Cady as a garish cartoon:

Things don’t improve by the remake’s finale, in which Scorsese’s need to add religious and thematic layers collides oddly with what I presume was the studio’s demand for thrills ’n chills; De Niro rants like a drunk Pentecostal minister as Nick Nolte, taking over Peck’s role as the straight man, tries killing him again and again. It’s gory and exhausting and not very fun.

It’s important to remember that 1991 was the nexus of two trends in thrillers: slasher flicks, which were in serious decline after an ‘80s vogue, and high-concept serial killer movies, then on the rise thanks to “Silence of the Lambs,” which hit theaters that year. To Scorsese’s credit, “Cape Fear” is a unique entry in that scrum of unstoppable killers—but it’s still a weird mess, probably the worst film of Marty’s career.

Now, a bit over 30 years later, because when Nietzsche was talking about ‘eternal return’ he definitely meant 21st century pop culture, we’re getting yet another remake, this time as—what else?—a 10-part series streaming this summer on Apple TV. Javier Bardem is taking the Cady role, which at first glance seems odd, because Cady has always been a wily redneck with rage issues, not a suave Spanish gentleman. Then again, Bardem did play Chigurh, the taciturn existentialist with the cattle-gun who makes everyone’s lives shorter and/or miserable in the adaptation of “No Country for Old Men,” so he can be menacing… but Chigurh is a radically different beast from Cady as played by either Mitchum or De Niro.

If I had to guess, I’d say that Bardem will play Cady a lot like his drug-lord character in Michael Mann’s “Collateral”: superficially friendly, but deadly underneath:

I have zero doubts he can pull it off, but do we really need 10 episodes devoted to this particular plot? The novel that kicked off all these adaptations, John D. MacDonald’s “The Executioners,” is a.) a slim volume, and b.) has a terrible climax that the movies have only improved upon. Each movie is standard length, and you walk away feeling like you’ve gotten a complete course of Southern justice.

With a 10-episode series, though, I can guarantee we’re getting at least one episode devoted to Cady’s backstory, and at least one focusing on attorney Tom Bowden (now played by Patrick Wilson, which, if you’re looking for someone with vaguely Peck-ish qualities, perfect casting) and his wife Anna (Amy Adams). Plus another episode or two of side-quests for the main characters, blah-blah-blah. A couple generations ago, people consumed epic novels in serial format—Tolstoy, Dickens—that exhaustively broke down every facet of their characters. Now we have “prestige” TV shows serving the same purpose, but, like Scorsese’s version of Cady, there’s something loud and tiresome about it; you’re not gaining insight, you’re contributing to ‘watched minutes’ in an executive’s spreadsheet.

We don’t need this much explanation. Over a century, movies became very good at conveying broad swaths of backstory and character with just a few details, even (in the hands of a skilled director) a single shot in context. I don’t think we’re in danger of losing the collective ability to go short, to say lots with little… but if more filmmakers and show-runners embraced that ethos, there’d be much less noise out there. I don’t need 10 hours of Max Cady, Bardem or no. Give me Mitchum instead.

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Nick Kolakowski is the author of several crime novels, including “Where the Bones Lie”, “Payback is Forever”, „Maxine Unleashes Doomsday“ and „Boise Longpig Hunting Club“ as well as the Love & Bullets trilogy of novellas. His work has been nominated for the Anthony and Derringer awards, and his short story “Scorpions” appeared in The Best Mystery and Suspense 2024. His short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and magazines, including Mystery Weekly, Shotgun Honey, Rock and a Hard Place Press, and more.

Just out: RIGHTEOUS TRASH, the third book in what is called the Boise Noir Trilogy. Rock and a Hard Place Press did a masterful job on the cover (as they did with the reissued editions of the first two books in the trilogy, BOISE LONGPIG HUNTING CLUB and RATTLESNAKE RODEO).

RIGHTEOUS TRASH follows Jake, an Iraq War veteran and former bounty hunter, and his gun-running sister Frankie as they try to dig themselves out of a big financial hole the only way they know how—by doing something incredibly insane and possibly deadly. »This time around, the action isn’t restricted to Idaho; there’s also a sequence set in New Orleans that’s a.) based on a real-life incident, if you can believe it, and b.) one of the funnier things I’ve written. The book’s centerpiece is also the craziest robbery I could think of—I had a lot of fun orchestrating that bit of chaos.«

His „Payback is Forever“ (Shotgun Honey 2022) is inspired clearly by the novels of Richard Stark. Our review here (in German). – See also his Hell of a Mess. A Love & Bullets Hookup.

Nick Kolakowski, geboren 1980, aufgewachsen in Washington. D.C., hat Geschichte in Chicago studiert. Er schreibt Romane, Kurzgeschichten, Lyrik und Essays, viele davon über Crime Fiction und verwandte Themen. Seine Texte erscheinen u. a. in der Washington Post, in Shotgun Honey, North American Review, The Evergreen Review, Rust & Months. Kolakowski lebt in New York City. Eine Besprechung des von Parker inspirierten „Payback is Forever“ in unseren Bloody Chops.

Bei Suhrkamp auf Deutsch: Love & Bullets.
His essays with us. 

His website nickkolakowski.com

His column „Smoking Gun“ with us: 
‘Salem’s Lot’ and the Horror of a Stephen King Adaptation
(27) „Rebel Ridge“: Calmly Burn the Whole Thing Down
‘Monsieur Spade’ and the Faustian Bargain
John Woo is Remaking ‘The Killer.’ But Why?
The Newest ‘Ripley’ Series is Stunning and Flawed
‘Sugar’: Not the Neo-Noir Revival We Need
(3) Moral Redemption in Noir: Is It Possible?
(4) What Makes Jack Reacher Tick?
(5) ‘True Detective: Night Country’ Tries to Make the Familiar into Something New
(6) Is David Fincher’s ‘The Killer’ a Comedy? 
(7) Rewatching ‘Drive’: Gosling as Noir’s Apex Predator
(8) Elmore Leonard  – City Primeval
(9) Cormac McCarthy Used Crime Fiction’s Tropes to Make Masterpieces
(10) Parker: Donald Westlake’s One Amazing Trick
(11) Cosby, Winslow, Pruitt: Three Heavy-Hitting Thillers for Summer
(12) Weed-Based Crime Thrillers are Going Up in Smoke
(13) ‘The Last of Us’: Crime in the Post-Apocalypse 
(14) What Made “Glass Onion” and “Knives Out” So Popular?
(15) Jordan Harper’s One-Two Punch of Crime Fiction Deserves a Wide Audience
(16) ‘True Detective’ Season 2: Was It Better Than We All Thought?
(17) From ‘Touch of Evil’ to ‘True Detective,’ Long Shots are Crime Films’ Secret Weapon
(18) Michael Mann, again: What Michael Mann Teaches Us About Enduring Crime Fiction
(19) „Heat 2“ – How Do You Craft a Sequel to a Masterpiece?
(20) 4 Ways Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” Novel Stands Out From the Film.
(21) On „Heat“: Manhunter Takes Down Thief: How Michael Mann’s Early Career Led to ‘Heat’
(22) The Most Honest Nihilism – on „The Way of the Gun“
(23) No, Time to Die – The latest James Bond movie digs into the fatalism at the iconic spy’s core.
(24) Cormac McCarthy’s Overlooked Masterpiece? – „The Councelor“
(25) „Nightmare Alley“ – How Guillermo del Toro’s Film Alters a Masterpiece Noir Novel
(26) David Cronenberg – The Carnal Crime of “A History of Violence” and “Eastern Promises”
(27) With Parker, Donald E. Westlake Pulled Off Crime Fiction’s Most Spectacular Magic Trick
(28) Guy Ritchie’s Return to Crime Films is Worth Watching
(29) Alex Garland’s ‘Civil War’: Hint of Things to Come?
(30) David Lynch and the Beautiful Weirdness
(31) ‘Where the Bones Lie’ and the Engine of California Noir
(32) “Den of Thieves 2”: Stealing from the Best
(33) White Lotus and the Gentle Art of Hating Your Protagonists
(34) Neal Stephenson
(35) Where is Storytelling Going?
(36) ‚She Rides Shotgun‘ and the Making of Legends
(37) Jack Bauer, ‘24’ and the Great Memory-Hole
(38) How “Play Dirty” Did Richard Stark’s Parker Dirty
(39) ‘The Lowdown,’ Jim Thompson and the Ghosts of Noir
(40) “The Rip”: An Atypical Director Delivers a Typical Crime Thriller