An Analysis of the Relationship Between the Two Adaptations of Cape Fear.

Here I will analyse the relationship between J. Lee Thompson’s 1961 film ‘Cape Fear’ and Martin Scorsese’s 1991 re-make of the same name. In analysing the relationship between these two films, we must first understand the great social differences between American society in 1961 and American society in 1991, mainly with regard to the structure of, and relationships within, the American family. Although both Thompson’s and Scorsese’s interpretations of the story, remove the two Bowden boys, in order to focus the story around the threat that Max Cady poses, specifically to Sam Bowden’s daughter Nancy , in the 1961 version and in a more modern portrayal as Danielle, in the 1991 film. Scorsese’s depiction of a sexualised Danielle is central to the composition of his film. It is the sexual behaviour of Danielle, in particular in the school sequence with Cady, which drives him to pursue the family almost as much as Sam’s ‘betrayal’ of him at his trial, fifteen years earlier. Scorsese also uses Danielle’s sexualisation to introduce operations of patriarchy, in the form of a possible incestuous relationship, between young Danielle and her father. This is most graphically hinted at in the bedroom scene, when Sam tells Danielle to “Put on some clothes, you’re not a child anymore.” This act is almost an admission from Sam that he sees Danielle as a sexual being. It is also a strong indicator that all is not well in Sam’s marriage. This in turn marks one of the 1991 film’s major ideological differences from the 1961 adaptation and McDonald’s book. As in both of the previous adaptations, the Bowden family has been presented to the reader/audience as a strong, loving unit which has come under attack from an evil, animalistic psychopath. However, by 1991 there had been great ideological shifts in the structure of the nuclear family. In the thirty years between adaptations, divorce had become almost as common in America as marriage itself, and Scorsese’s Bowden family reflect these huge ideological shifts. These shifts leave the viewer with a depiction of a family which is already fractured, and in crisis before the arrival of Cady, and after his arrival it is plain to see that the Bowden’s are under attack from both within and without.

This theme of a fragmenting family is light years away from the ideology of McDonald’s book, which depicted the Bowden’s’ as the most upstanding of American families with three beautiful, good children who must battle for their lives against the monstrous Cady. The book is the quintessential good versus evil story, and to a large degree so is the Thompson film, as it is very clear that Peck’s Sam is the hero of the story, and Mitchum’s Cady is the monstrous evil he must overcome in order for him and his family to survive.

Scorsese’s adaptation however is much more ambiguous in this regard. Sam is represented as a deeply flawed character, who broke the rules when defending Cady, costing the man years of his life. He is a man who cheated on his wife possibly numerous times, but certainly once, and most disturbingly of all, harbours incestuous feelings towards his fifteen year old daughter Danielle.

This moral ambiguity not only greatly compromises Sam as the ‘hero’ of the story, but also demonstrates again the great cultural and ideological shifts, primarily with regard to the gaping cracks which had appeared in middle class life in American culture and society, in the thirty years since Thompson’s film. These changes in the makeup of Sam could also be seen as a reflection of the fact that, as a filmmaker, Scorsese has an infinitely darker view of human nature than Thompson.

Another interesting relationship between the two films and the book is the different ways in which women are treated and represented. For example, the Mrs Bowden of the book is depicted as a very lively and vibrant woman who loves to look after her children and is incredibly proud of her husband and his spirit. However, she is also very much a woman of her time, in that she fits very comfortably into the image of the late 1950’s wife who relies on her husband to be the bread winner, and is incapable of holding her emotions together regarding the presence of Cady in her life. This is best represented in the passage when she has a car accident, and the stress caused by this event causes her to suffer what appears to be a nervous breakdown. This means, as a result, she becomes even more reliant on Sam to lead and make decisions for the family.

The Mrs Bowden of the Thompson film is, in many ways very similar to her literary counterpart. However, the filmic depiction of Mrs Bowden has been modernised somewhat, in order to fit with a presentation of the story which is four years after the publication of the book, and at a time, 1961, when women are beginning to escape from their husband’s shadow and become more independent, and Peggy Bowen is adapted as such. For example, in the 1961 film the entire car accident passage is not included, and as a result Peggy does not suffer any kind of breakdown such as the one depicted in the novel. Due to this change, she plays more of an active part in defending her family against Cady, even physically struggling with him briefly in the houseboat.

By 1991 however, the role of women in society had changed dramatically, women were now seen as equals, fully capable of supporting themselves and much less reliant on men. The new Mrs Bowden, now named Leigh, is, to a degree representative of this change. She is depicted as standing up to Sam in domestic arguments, and is often depicted as a woman who does not really need her cheating husband, and is only staying with him for the sake of her teenage daughter. For all the strength and empowerment that the thirty year gap between adaptations has given Leigh, I feel that her character is, like that of Sam, deeply flawed, especially with regard to her relationships with men. This is best demonstrated in the sequence in which she sleeps with Sam, after he effectively forces himself on her. This demonstrates to the viewer that Leigh feels obligated to sleep with Sam, even when she doesn’t want to. This is a worrying depiction as it puts her back in the position of the Mrs Bowden in the 1957 novel, a woman doing her duty to her husband; in essence she is being depicted as being repressed once again. However, the most concerning aspect of the scene is when Leigh gets out of bed, puts on her make up as if she is heading off on a late night rendezvous with a lover, opens the curtains, and sees Cady sat on the wall watching her, with fireworks exploding behind him. The connotations of this sequence are obvious, and worrying. Scorsese is telling the audience that there is a wanting on Leigh’s part for Cady, who it appears she finds exiting, as the visual connotation of the fireworks tells us.

This sequence tells us a lot about the female dissatisfaction which is rife throughout the film, as the attraction to the rapist and murderer is not exclusive to Leigh, there are also many indications throughout the film that Danielle Bowden also has some kind of physical attraction to Cady.

The sexualisation of Danielle in the 1991 film, acts as a statement by Scorsese about the loss of childhood innocence, which has taken place in the thirty years between the adaptations. This loss of innocence is illustrated most explicitly in two scenes in the film; the first being the previously mentioned bedroom scene, the second is the school hall scene with Cady. This sequence is possibly the most disturbing in the film, as we are effectively watching Cady exhibiting all of the tell tale signs of a paedophile, grooming Danielle for sex. More worrying than this however is Danielle’s response to Cady’s behaviour. Despite being repeatedly warned as to how evil and dangerous the man is, she is extremely receptive to his attempt at seducing her, so much so that she kisses him and, most troublingly for the viewer, very suggestively sucks his finger. This sequence can also be seen as something of an intertextual reference to the first film, as this scene is very much a modernised re-imagining of the school scene from Thompson’s film. The kind of behaviour exhibited by Danielle in this sequence, acts as another strong indicator of the great female dissatisfaction within this film. This sequence is another example of the great cultural changes which have taken place in the thirty years between adaptations of the film.

As in the McDonald book, the theme of childhood innocence represented by Nancy is very strong indeed, in the 1961 film. She is represented as a pretty, intelligent girl who will one day blossom into a beautiful young woman. However there is never any implication of her sexualisation, other than one remark made by Cady at the dock: “She’s getting nearly as tasty as that mother of hers”. However, Nancy does not respond to this comment at all, primarily because is not heard by her, but by her father, who subsequently lashes out at Cady.

The school scene which is intertextually adapted by Scorsese, as the seduction scene mentioned already. Is by contrast, completely devoid of any sexual overtones in the 1961 film, and instead of arousing Danielle, Nancy is simply terrified by Cady. The Thompson film in fact sexualised Nancy to an even lesser degree than the book, written four years earlier, as in the literary adaptation Nancy has a love interest, an older boy named Tommy Kent, which indicates her growing sexuality.

One element of Scorsese’s film, which is not present in either the 1961 film or the novel, is the religious overtones. In particular in the transformation of Cady from sadistic psychopath who is attacking a good, pure family in the Bowden’s, to almost a religious avenger sent from god to ‘save’ them (primarily Sam), from the evil way in which they are living out their lives (having affairs, harbouring feelings of incest etcetera). This representation of Cady as a kind of twisted holy avenger is given more weight, by the fact that in this adaptation Cady serves not eight years in prison for his crimes, as in the original, but fifteen years. This also happens to be exactly the same number of years which are missing from the life of Christ in the bible. Although it is possible that this biblical reference is simply a coincidence, it is unlikely as Scorsese almost became a priest himself before deciding to become a filmmaker. Thus, he would be well aware of the link he had made, which would certainly suggest a level of ambivalence on Scorsese’s part towards the church.

Although in many ways, such as the religious aspect mentioned previously, Scorsese’s interpretation of “Cape Fear” is wildly different to that of J. Lee Thompson. His film is strewn with intertextual references to not only the original film, but also the work of Hitchcock in the era of genre films in the 1950’s. Many of these references also appear to support Sarah Cardwell’s theory of an “Intertextual chain of adaptations”.

One such example of this “intertextual chain” is Scorsese’s inclusion of the original Sam Bowden (Gregory Peck) and Max Cady (Robert Mitchum) into the film’s cast. These inclusions create a very strong and obvious intertextual link to the Thompson film. This kind of link sends a clear message that this film is very much self- aware, and Scorsese seems to revel in this awareness throughout the film. However, the fact that Peck was cast as the lawyer who defends Cady, (a villainous character) and that Mitchum was cast as the police chief who tries to help Sam (a sympathetic character), is very interesting, these castings turn the casting choices of Thompson’s film completely on their head, which makes for an interesting reversal for any audience with a knowledge of the original.

Another link in the intertextual chain between the two films is Bernard Herrmann’s score from the Thompson film, which is reprised by Scorsese for his adaptation, albeit re-worked by Elmer Bernstein to fit into a film which is twenty six minutes longer than the original. In order to pad out the score to cover this longer running time, Bernstein used some of a lost score which Herrmann created for Hitchcock’s “Torn Curtain” (1966) and was never used. Because of this, it can be argued that Scorsese is also making an intertextual reference to Hitchcock, as well as Herrmann, in ‘saving’ this lost work. This idea of intertextually referencing Hitchcock, is supported by Scorsese’s decision to hire Saul and Elaine Bass, who had previously worked on Herrmann scored Hitchcock films, such as “Psycho” (1960) and “North by Northwest” (1959) , to design the credit sequence for the film. This particular intertextual link to Hitchcock was one which ran through the majority of Scorsese’s 1990’s career.

Prior to “Cape Fear”, the Bass‘designed the credit sequence for “Goodfellas” (1990) and would also continue their relationship, with the design of the titles for “Casino” (1995). This would be Saul Bass’ last project before his death in April 1996. In consciously referencing these high profile figures from a bygone era of Hollywood, Scorsese is making his “Cape Fear” consciously movie literate, and in so doing he is effectively placing the film into this era, making it a true re-make of Thompson’s film. This is clearly what Scorsese wanted to achieve with the project as he himself describes it as, “a genre film in the classical style.”

Despite the numerous differences in the two director’s approaches to adapting the novel; Thompson’s version is a reflection of the war’s effect on the American psyche, and the de-sensitisation which has occurred in American culture as a result. Whereas Scorsese’s version is much more a comment on the ideological shifts since the original, especially regarding the cracks which have appeared in American middle class married life, and the loss of childhood innocence. These two versions still share a number of similarities, due mainly to Scorsese’s knowledge of intertextuality and the notion of an intertextual chain of adaptations. Because of the links which Scorsese has deliberately made between his interpretation of “The Executioners”, and that of Thompson, it is very difficult not to think of the 1991 film as a direct re-make. This notion is also supported by Scorsese himself, as he has stated many times that he considers his film to be a re-make in the traditional style. Another strong factor in the 1991 film being considered to be a direct remake, is the presence of the stars of the 1961 film, Peck and Mitchum, this confirms the film as a re-make albeit with a very different set of messages and values.

In this essay I have discussed the relationship between J. Lee Thompson’s 1961 adaptation of “Cape Fear”, and Martin Scorsese’s 1991 remake. I have looked at the possibility of an intertextual “chain” of adaptation, as argued by Sarah Cardwell, and found there to be strong evidence within the 1991 film, of Scorsese intertextually referencing not only Thompson’s original, but also the work of Alfred Hitchcock, one of the great directors at the time of the original film’s release.

I have also investigated issues of the remake in regard to Scorsese’s film, and although there is a strong argument for it to be considered as more of a modernised re-imagining of the original, the 1991 film falls into the category of a quintessential re-make, if there is such a thing. The reason the film falls into this category is its knowing self awareness, displayed in the volume of intertextual references that are present, in particular the presence of both stars of the original film; Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum in the Scorsese version, this makes for creating an incredibly strong intertextual link between the two filmic presentations. Other links in the intertextual chain of adaptations, which strongly connect Scorsese’s film to the original, are the inclusion of two of the most affecting sequences from the 1961 film, albeit in a greatly mutated form. These are; the scene in which Nancy/Danielle is confronted with Cady at school, and, of course the iconic final sequence aboard the houseboat on Cape Fear. With such strong intertextual references as these and others mentioned in this essay, Scorsese’s “Cape Fear” can only be described as a re-make, despite the large number of cultural and ideological shifts away from Thompson’s original, which are expressed within the film.

Bibliography: