Cape Fear

Have You Ever Seen

Our 6th of 7 episodes during this Revenge Month takes us to America's Deep South as we talk about Robert Mitchum making Gregory Peck's life a living hell in Cape Fear. What's more, the convicted rapist threatens the lawyer's family in some of the worst way's a hateful person can. "Rape" is never spoken in the dialogue, but it's a constant theme. Mitchum plays such a clever, sadistic villain. He's one of the most-sinister of anyone on AFI's Heroes & Villains list and he could have ranked even higher on that list than he did. We also talked a lot about the dubious morality in Martin Scorsese's flashy 1991 remake, but the focus of this show is on J. Lee Thompson's tense original. So, counsellors, take dangerous matters into your own hands as this 585th edition of Have You Ever Seen pokes a toe in the river before going off the deep end into Cape Fear.

For The Record: the actual Cape Fear is in North Carolina. Also, while Robert De Niro is certainly covered in tattoos in the 1991 version, he doesn't have the "love/hate" knuckle tattoos that Mitchum has in The Night Of The Hunter (and that Radio Raheem also has as knuckle rings in Do The Right Thing).

Waiting in the weeds for something bad to happen would be made better if you had a container of scrumptious coffee with you. Our sponsor, Sparkplug Coffee, offers our listeners a 20% discount if they'll just our "HYES" promo code. Go to "sparkplug.coffee/hyes".

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