—This article is excerpted from the book "Park Chan Wook's Montage" P265
Although Martin Scorsese's "Cape of Terror" broke the box office record of "The True Colors of Money", (perhaps because of this) there has always been a tendency to be underestimated in comments. There are several reasons outside of the movie. First of all, before the release of his latest work "The Age of Innocence", $34 million was the highest production budget he could get. This may actually become a flaw in the artistic career of film directors, because the budget of art films has never been too much. This is the fixed concept of critics. In fact, many directors use large budgets to make art films, such as Jean Renoir’s "French Cancan", Rainer Werner Fassbender’s "Lily Marie" and Spike Lee’s "Malcolm x" all shows that too much investment can turn into poison! For real artists, proper poverty is absolutely necessary! The problem is that "Cape Terror" is not an art movie.
The most important thing is that there are two important driving factors for the planning of this movie: one is De Niro's ambition to play Max; the other is Spielber, who wants to win over Scorsese's seniors and make a fortune. Grid of abacus. For Scorsese, "The True Colors of Money" is the first work in his life that has been planned by others. Similar to "The Color of Money" is a sequel to "The Prodigal Son", "Cape of Terror" is actually a remake. Are they all reaping benefits by standing on the shoulders of predecessors? Obviously not. Scorsese is the best gangster film director in history that even the late Quentin Tarantino can't match. With his skilful skills and unique thinking, he naturally included those parts of the original "Cape Terror" that made the audience remember, and quietly put his thoughts on the movie into it. Despite this, critics who have always been biased against the remake still turn a blind eye to the film. Is this really a movie that can be ignored? Didn't the various changes that occurred during the remake better present the real Scorsese? Is there anything hidden under the deep green mud of Cape Terror?
It has been 30 years since the last version of "Cape Terror" was released. Scorsese's "Corner of Terror" immediately caused a sensation as soon as it was released. Regardless of whether you like this film or not, almost all critics will add warnings that need attention at the end of the comments, and gritted their teeth for the naked display of human brutality and sexual hints.
When it was screened in the UK, the director even had a fierce argument with the head of the censorship authority, and finally got the release permission after deleting the four-minute film length. The cold-hearted novelist Barry Gifford, who is crazy about the movie, even sets the background of his novel "My Heart is Wild" (David Lynch once made it into a movie) in the horror corner. But Barry Gifford wrote in his film noir tour: "Unfortunately, this film does not have many elements worth mentioning, but once you have seen it, it is hard to forget."
In addition to this point, "My Heart is Wild" and Scorsese's "Cape of Terror" have some peculiar similarities. Compare the scene where William Dafoe seduces Laura Dunn in a hotel room with the scene where Robert De Niro seduces Juliette Lewis in the school theater. While the two women contemptuously despise the shameless and despicable man, they are eager to have a sexual encounter with them. Although there is no real sex, women who realize that they are mentally cheating hate their shamelessness, and at the same time regret that they have not been able to satisfy their desires. These two scenes can be described as disgusting scenes that are indistinguishable in the entire film history.
Regarding the 30-year difference, we can start with the casting. Gifford’s essay is full of praise for Robert and Mitchum: "The remaining actors only exist to set off Mitchum." In this film, Lieutenant Elgart played by Robert Mitchum Together with his crazy priest in the infamous cult classic movie "Hunter's Night", he became Mitchum's best role. The extraordinarily heavy eyelids are always half-open, the voice is low, and the speaking speed is slow, it is simply the incarnation of a pure demon that does not need any modifiers to decorate.
Max Cardi accidentally said that as soon as he was released from prison, he went to find his wife who had betrayed him, then imprisoned her in a hotel, raped and beat each other for several days, and finally stripped her clothes and threw them to the highway. On the highway (the bridge section is not in the original work). From this description, we can't see at all his efforts to threaten lawyers, and some are just extremely natural self-flaunting. Just as some people don't need to show off, but also exude the virtues of intelligence, humility, and courtesy, Max Cardi's body is very naturally full of evil roots. Robert De Niro is really a charismatic and talented actor. Having said that, I think of a scene. In the final duel, the scene where Lieutenant Elgart took off his shirt and entered the Cape of Terror was particularly fascinating. In the absence of any director-level auxiliary audiovisual effects, it is just immersion in the swamp, but it is enough to remind people of reptiles such as crocodiles or dinosaurs in prehistoric times. The image of that cold-blooded animal is creepy. In this way, many actions and scene descriptions are naturally superfluous. The scene of beating the lady who met in the tavern can be omitted. The audience only needs to see a woman who is completely lost, and it is not difficult to guess what happened. Therefore, the threat of rape against a minor daughter only needs to be dealt with by his sight a few times. Even without making any expressions, it is enough to feel the disgust, it is simply disgusting.
In contrast, what is Robert De Niro like? He is knowledgeable, benefiting from the law, philosophy and theology taught by himself in prison, and has become a compound existence with Mitchum's physical and spiritual power plus knowledge. With tattoos all over his body, using a lighter in the shape of a swimsuit girl to light a cigar as thick as his wrist, and wearing a tacky Hawaiian shirt, you can imagine that this is the worst scum in the world. The content of the tattoo is full of sentences about revenge in the "Bible", "I want revenge", "God is an avenger", "truth and justice" and so on. He is not so much a former man who lives for revenge, as he is a legendary revenge angel.
Worthy of being a god-man who often quotes "Bible" chapters to intimidate others, the end of Max's life is as heroic as a martyr. As he sank into the water, he shouted hoarsely: "I want to cross the Jordan River..." The way he sang praise songs made the audience unable to vent. In the end, he stared at the lawyer with bloodshot eyes, and then slowly dived into the water. This is the end of the matter, but who can rest assured? If Mitchum is a difficult enemy to kill, then De Niro is an unkillable enemy. If Thompson's "Cape Terror" is a pure noir film, then Scorsese's is a pure horror film, the "Cape Terror" in the era of Freddy (the immortal villain in the "Ghost Street" series).
In addition, Gregory Parker, who played the attorney Sam in the 1962 version of the film, contrasted sharply with Mitchum with his wood-like boring acting skills. In fact, this is not the actor's fault, it should be caused by the lack of abilities of the screenwriter and director. In the original work, Sam and his family are too simple. Gregorian Parker is an incompetent parent who only mustered up the courage until the end. He plays a typical negative character. In that case, who would sympathize with this characterless protagonist? Scorsese focused on this weakness from the beginning and fully demonstrated his ambition. Whether it can flop or not, in fact, has already been clues in the casting process. Gregorian Parker is the cunning lawyer who helps Max in the new work, and Robert Mitchum is the lieutenant who sympathizes with Sam. Scorsese's purpose is to deny the dichotomy of good and evil and to undermine the ideology of the middle class. Therefore, Sam played by Nick Knott appears as a completely different role. In the previous part, he witnessed the rape case and testified in court, so he became Max’s unshakable enemy. But in the new version, he is no longer a victim of that kind of goodwill, he has become the official lawyer of Max’s rape and assault incident. Of course, he should do his best to defend the client's innocence or reduce the sentence, but he used his emotions and left his responsibilities behind.
Because his client is shameless, he concealed information that was beneficial to the client. Finally, Max, who might have been acquitted or sentenced to 8 years in prison, was sentenced to 14 years in prison. As the spokesperson of the democratic legal order, Sam has seriously violated professional ethics and can no longer continue to hold the title of good man like the previous one. In a word, Sam has become a person who deserves to be punished, and the film has become a battlefield between the justice provided by the law and the humanity advocating for good. The final yacht scene is the climax of the film.
Later Max tied up Sam, and then began a mock trial, and the yacht instantly turned into a courtroom. The yacht, which symbolizes the easy life of the middle class, is either frantically bumpy in the shower, or hovering on the water, and eventually hits a reef and is damaged. In other words, it fell to the ninth hell of Dante mentioned by Max, which is an underwater hell that only the perfidious people can go to. Sam, who won unilaterally in class contradictions 30 years ago, was "retaliated" by Scorsese. Knott's role in the film exists entirely to withstand all sorts of teasing. There is no masculine temperament. The timid and stupid man is like a headless fly at a loss, and his appearance is ridiculous. And he is the culprit who caused this chaos. In the black and white version, the perfect, kind, and innocent wife and daughter, after entering the 1990s, fully adapted to the trend of the times and became fallen angels, and it was the parents who caused this. At the beginning of the film, Sam accepted a divorce lawsuit. He tried to bankrupt his cheating husband, but he actually did something immoral.
Wife Li still finds it difficult to get rid of the shadow of her husband having an affair. On the surface, the two lived very peacefully, but in fact, the relationship between the husband and wife had already been cracked. In the middle of the movie, her husband cheated again, and she bluntly expressed contempt towards her husband. The first bedroom shot seemed very happy at first glance. The laughing couple actually turned their backs to each other and were talking in the mirror. In the sex scene, men and women are shaking hands, and the close-up shot of the hand wearing the wedding ring suddenly turns into a black and white image. Is it necessary to see through the perspective of the marriage relationship?
After the unpleasant sex ended, the wife was pacing bored in the bedroom. When she looked out the window, she spotted a person. Of course, that person was the beautiful fireworks blooming in the sky behind Max, as if celebrating him. Was released (actually to celebrate the upcoming Independence Day). The lipstick in Li's hand has a visual connection with the cigar in his mouth, which is of course suggestive. Max sat straddling a fence, and Nick Knott wore the same tome glasses as the incompetent husband Dustin Hoffman in "Straw Dog" (directed by Sam Pekinpa). This shot implies that her family does not have a strong wall.
To make matters worse, her daughter Daniel was suspended from school for smoking marijuana. She has great dissatisfaction with parents who always treat themselves as children. When his parents quarreled, Daniel realized his parents' corrupt behavior. The mother looked at the dog and said to herself: "You seem to have been transferred in the hospital." It sounded more like it was for her daughter. The first scene where Sam and his family were in the same frame was in a movie theater, when the movie "Problem Children" was released. Regarding Max, who hindered everyone from watching the movie, Daniel said: "Dad should knock that guy down to the ground and face the daughter who regards himself as an incompetent and cowardly coward. The father responded with a game of strangling his neck.
After all, this family is not the Garden of Eden, and Max is not a snake outside. He is not so much an intruder, but rather a mirror effect that appears inside. The middle-class family is a quagmire that begins to rot from inside, and Max is a "demon" born from the foam on the surface of the quagmire. The "credit unit" derived from the famous designer Saul Bass and his wife is composed of the eyes and contours of Max appearing on the surface of the horror corner, as well as the superimposition of facial close-ups and blood drops. This concept clearly reflects that Max is actually a portrayal of the anger, pain and distorted desire of the Sam family. That mirror is a single-sided reflecting mirror. When Max was searched at the police station, Sam observed Max in the room through the glass, but Max could only see himself in the mirror. However, during the Independence Day parade, Max wore reflective sunglasses, which reversed this relationship. Although Max can see Sam clearly, Sam can only see himself reflected in the lens. Pay attention to what a private investigator said to Sam: "Once you know that you are not at home, there will be a fly near your house." Is it possible that Sam's family is a flies-seeking toilet?
There are two different views on female sex in the film. Li and Daniel are sexually suppressed women. Li's husband cannot satisfy her, and Daniel's sexual desire in adolescence is not recognized. When Sam, who was supposed to be hiding in his own home, stood up suddenly because of a mistake, Daniel shouted: "Dad can't stand up." This was not only to remind his father not to be found by Max outside the window, but also to mock his father who could not get an erection. The mother and daughter have sexual fantasies about the beastly Max. In addition, after Sam’s lover Rohri was thrown away by the married man, he accepted Max’s temptation with a self-defeating mentality, and suffered a terrible atrocities (Max, who bit her face, is more like a vampire than a rapist) . The women in the film unanimously give people the impression of a desire to be raped. Finally, Lee confessed to Max that she had a strong resonance with him. She said that she could understand the deep sense of loss in Max’s heart. Max was because Sam lost 14 years, and she was because Sam lost The happiness brought by married life.
In addition, Daniel's orthodontic appliance is equivalent to Max's finger in her mouth in the school theater. Max said that while he was being gang-raped by homosexuals in prison, he suddenly discovered the latent femininity in him. It can be seen that the director has been emphasizing the image of women as victims. But when Max pretended to be a woman, everything reversed. Just like the mother and daughter Bates in "The Cry", women become attackers. Could it be that Scorsese named Sam's wife Lee after Jenny Lee in "The Cry"?
Similarly, her daughter's name was changed from Nancy to Daniel. In the "Old Testament", Daniel is an expert in dream interpretation and language. In "Cape Terror", Daniel appeared before and after the film and stated that the film was adapted from her own memory, and many years later, she can still wake Max from her dream. All this may be her dream, or suggest that Max is not dead, just like the immortal demon Freddie Krueger that appeared in the dreams of middle-class adolescent girls.
When I went to the New York Film Festival this year, I was invited by Scorsese. I visited his office, collection promotion, meeting room, and observed his daily work in the editing room. I really want to hear more about the beauty of his work. But he has been talking about my movies and Chunnan's works. I can't rashly interrupt the topic that is pouring down like a waterfall and ask about the story of "Cape Terror". I went there with the mentality of a student, but in the end I found that the real student was him.
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