(1962)
Dir - J. Lee Thompson
Overall: GREAT
A top-notch thriller that would in turn spawn a memorable remake by Martin Scorsese as well as arguably the finest Sideshow Bob episode of The Simpsons, Cape Fear is a stand-out work for its director J. Lee Thompson as well as stars Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum. Due to the censors at the time, John D. MacDonald's 1957 source material novel The Executioners was re-worked, alluding to instead of explicitly addressing the rape crimes committed by Mitchum's antagonist, as well as changing him to a southern thug instead of a disgraced soldier. The source of horror comes in the frustration faced by Peck's attorney and family who do everything in their power to reason with the unreasonable; a man that makes one sly move after the other to avoid prosecution for his revenge agenda. This in turn pushes the good guys to do things against their moral compass, which plays right into the hands of Mitchum's odious villain who longs for the slow and painful psychological torment of his prey. Thompson deliberately channels Alfred Hitchcock from the director's chair, (and the master of suspense's Bernard Herman was even snagged to do the memorable score), and the whole thing expertly builds to a taught climax that is both satisfying and exhaustively ravaged.
(1964)
Dir - Walter Grauman
Overall: GOOD
This nasty and claustrophobic thriller from director Walter Grauman and producer/screenwriter Luther Davis transcends its plot gimmick by becoming a transgressive assault on the tumultuous decade in which it was made. Trapping Olivia de Havilland in an electronic lift in her spacious home has the potential to solely examine the gradual psychological turmoil that such a thing would inflict, but Davis' script for Lady in a Cage throws in numerous other angles to up that turmoil. It has a note from her son that could be read as a suicidal cry for help, a wino burglarizing her and then bringing his friend along, three hoodlums also breaking in to cause way more unwholesome mayhem, and a nihilistic tone where nobody does the right thing and our protagonist's desperate pleas go unanswered and mocked. While 1964 studio pictures were not versed in completely downtrodden endings, the overarching bitterness still presents a movie with no winners, only those who get their just desserts or in the case of de Havilland, end up emotionally and permanently bulldozed by the chain of events. It pushes things further than most in this regard and the performances go for melodramatic gusto which is fitting for material. James Caan in his first credited role does his best Marlon Brando impression and is particularly ghastly.
Dir - T. L. P. Swicegood
Overall: WOOF
Three years after Herschell Gordon Lewis dropped what is recognized as the first gore film Blood Feast, the ridiculously named T. L. P. Swicegood made his own tasteless, Z-grade crud rock in a similar vein. The Undertake and His Pals is Swicegood's only movie as director and that is the best thing that one can say about it since unlike Lewis, he never unleashed a series of these throughout the years. The premise can only be handled in a comedic fashion where an undertaker overcharges people and splits some of their body parts with two yahoos that run a restaurant that is perpetually out of anything that anybody orders. Of course this means that human meat is always substituted on the menu, but what logic if any pertains to their arrangement with the undertaker of the title is never convincingly explained, nor important. The violence is primitive even by Lewis' standards, but there is still plenty of bright red blood splatter and some stock surgery footage of an open chest. Also, lots of people die in lackluster and moronic ways, some of which are played for laughs that never come. This optimizes the entire film; one that tries to be funny yet is more embarrassingly stupid and cheap than anything. That in and of itself though can provide some chuckles for the trash enthusiast out there.
No comments:
Post a Comment