Starring: Robert De Niro, Nick Nolte, Jessica Lange
While I was watching this movie, I thought to myself, 'boy, De Niro and Nolte both sort of peaked with this'.
Reading through their imdbs, they have each had a few good movies since then, but De Niro has mostly gone soft and 'adult contemporary' and Nolte, he's just crazy.
This story follows a recently released rapist who follows the man who was his lawyer and his family and terrorizes them. Lesser roles contributed by Gregory Peck and Juliette Lewis (at the end and beginning of their careers, respectively). De Niro does an excellent job playing the antagonist and really gets inside of Nolte's head (or his character, rather) by interacting with his wife and daughter. The name of the movie plays a double, as they are on their houseboat at a place called 'Cape Fear' and, well, the fear part is rather obvious.
This brought to mind one of my favourite Simpsons episodes that was based on this movie. In that episode, Sideshow Bob plays the De Niro character who chases the family out of town, forcing them to relocate under the witness protection program as 'the Sampsons'. Bob, much like De Niro, straps himself to the bottom of the vehicle to follow the family. In the Simpsons, there is obviously the addition of comedy, such as the family taking a detour through a cactus field while Bob is under the car and Bob stepping on a slew of rakes right after he detaches himself. The saviour in the movie is a can of lighter fluid sprayed by Juliette Lewis onto De Niro while he lights his cigar, combined with a crash of the boat allowing the family to get away. The saviour on the Simpsons was Bart asking Bob to sing the entire score of the H.M.S. Pinafore when he realizes they will be back in Sprinfield by the time that is over.
While not really scary or terrorizing by today's standards, it was still a well done movie. I'll give it a 7/10, with probably .5 or 1 point of that coming from the fact it reminds me of that lovely Simpsons episode.
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