Cape Fear

After an eight-year prison term for rape and assault, Max Cady (Robert Mitchum) is set free. Immediately making a beeline to Sam Bowden (Gregory Peck), the former prosecutor responsible for Cady's conviction, Cady laconically informs Sam that he intends to "pay back" the attorney for his years ...more

Robert Mitchum, one of the screen's most ruthless figures, was most menacing when he was most amiable. His role as Max Cady in Cape Fear (the role reprised by Robert De Niro in Martin Scorsese's 1991 remake) comes in second in the sinister sweepstakes only to his chilling performance for Charles Laughton in Night of the Hunter seven years earlier. Mitchum's Cady is every father's and husband's worst nightmare: an untouchable, unstoppable, unrepentant corrupter of innocence. . .all with a ...more