Clutter was a nice, gentle man up until the time he slit his throat. On his end, Truman lies his face off to Perry - no, he doesn't have a title for his book, he hasn't written much, Perry's sister misses him, etc. But along the way, Capote begins to feels a kinship for this young man, who shares a similar unhappy childhood with him. He attempts to detach himself from the situation as the killers get stays of execution, but finally, it's too much.
He can't finish the book because they're not dead, and the constant notes from Perry are driving him crazy. Perry asks for help in getting another lawyer; Truman writes him a letter and says that he's tried but he can't.
We know he didn't try. Capote has what can best be described as a nervous breakdown when, in between drinking bouts, he takes to his bed and stops talking. Once he returns to Kansas, he will witness events that will haunt him for the rest of his life. Keener's straightforward acting as Harper Lee is a nice juxtaposition to the outrageous Truman. The film is made with incredible attention to detail to set the atmosphere of '50s Kansas, right down to the clothing and color pallet chosen for the film.
In the DVD commentary, someone said that Capote probably helped Perry to come to terms with what he'd done. After seeing documentaries involving these murders, it seems clear that Perry never accepted what he'd done and always saw himself as a victim, complaining that he could have been a great artist.
But although they each had bad childhoods, Capote ended up as a world-famous author while Perry wound up a cold-blooded murderer. Theresa of Avila, and it fits in Capote's case. For the rest of his life, Capote would have to live with the great fame he sought being the result of murder and the fact that, for his mental torture to stop and for his book to complete, he wanted and needed the killers to be dead.
Quinoa 4 February A film like Capote works due to two things- the credibility of the story, and it's casting. The director doesn't have to do THAT much, though for what it's worth Bennet Miller does a good job setting up a dark mood for much of the film, with maybe a little much hand-held camera-work to add the 'indie' touch, but some chilling music as well. Philip Seymour Hoffman is the likely pick for the Oscar, and while it's of course un-fair to ever pick a definite winner over other good performances, Hoffman here scores a nifty triumph into his catalog of character-actor parts.
He creates a pure dimension in this character of Truman Capote, who in real life had a lot of hubris with his writing, though also had enough sensitivity and observance of the truth, however grisly. His book 'In Cold Blood' I have not yet read, though from the story presented from the facts in this film, it's definitely quite the intriguing one, especially when we get introduced into the mind-set of Perry Smith.
Truman, with author Harper Lee Catherine Keener, a good though not brilliant performance as more of a smaller character than anything , goes to investigate four killings in Kansas in Perry Smith and his partner in crime Dick Hickock get a quick trial and sentenced to death, but over the years of appeals, Capote keeps visiting Smith in his jail cell- in between his elite social engagements and drinks and writing, of course - trying to get the ultimate truth about November 14th of It's in these scenes, between Hoffman and Clifton Collins Jr as Perry Smith, that the film becomes totally, can't-leave-eyes-from-the-screen watchable film-making.
The cinematography by Adam Kimmel is effective in its use of shadows and bits of light, and the shocking part of the sort of 'revelation' in the final cell meeting to Capote is very shocking. Miller, who's only other credit is a documentary film from years back, doesn't hold back on that flashback. It's in the scenes when Capote finally becomes vulnerable, and breaks his hubris in his moral conflict, that Hoffman strikes some rich ground.
His is a character that is highly respected among is peers, admired almost to the heavens as the 'inventor of the non-fiction novel'.
In some of these scenes it actually isn't all that strong, however necessary they are for the story. It's when it comes down to this kind of intense, duplicitous kind of investigating and connection between the writer and the killer that the drama runs high. And it is well worth to note that although acting all around in the film is top notch, Collins Jr is in a true breakout performance here, as a person with a lot of deep wounds and terrible vibes behind his 'sensitive side'.
It almost becomes a tad manipulative on the director, though it's through getting in the first hour- which almost rushes through the kind of procedure of researching and writing a book of this sort- for the good stuff. Anyone who's interested in film acting would do well to see at least the crucial parts of this film, as it has some of the best contained in any film of Philip Seymour Hoffman, ordinarily a tremendous actor, is downright dull in this film regarding Truman Capote's research for "In Cold Blood.
Also, that farewell scene between Capote and the condemned killers was similar in nature to that of Elizabeth Taylor visiting a condemned Montgomery Clift. The differences were that the characters in "Place" were more alive. The killers in "Capote" were sadistic sickos who definitely got what they deserved. No question whatsoever here in the use of capital punishment. I was wondering if Capote used the title "In Cold Blood" to describe what was actually done to the killers of the Clutter Family.
He lies to one of the condemned murderers when they question him about the title of his book. Naturally, Capote had formed a homosexual bond with one of the killers. This conflicted him for he fully realized what this guy had done and the guy's own sister condemned him as well.
Katherine Keener, who received a best supporting actress Oscar nomination, for Harper Lee is wasted in this film. Shown as a chain smoking writer, she is given little to do in the movie. Surely, the writer of "To Kill A Mockingbird" deserved better than this.
Then again, we deserved a better film as well. In a nutshell, "Famed author Truman Capote befriends two murderers while researching his celebrated book 'In Cold Blood' - and finds himself changed to the core. Capote makes me want to disagree, slightly, with this film's closing theme. The film portends Capote "never finished another book" due to an emotional attachment formed with killer Perry Smith.
But the real reason for Capote's writer's block was that he was never again really sober long enough to call upon Clio, or any of the other muses which fueled his creativity. Grandmother enjoyed this film, but not more than either "In Cold Blood" or the real Truman Capote when he wasn't being too sardonic. Capote might have appreciated this film while trashing it in public , as it could be described as the dramatization by Dan Futterman of a speculative biography by Gerald Clarke about a nonfiction novel by Capote.
Secondary sources rule. And, for a film, there is a surprising lack of intimacy shown. Capote and companion Bruce Greenwood as Jack Dunphy are like brothers, his much-heralded "love" for Smith is debatable, and only once does Capote try to hook up don't blink with a potential sex partner.
The production is first rate, with director Bennett Miller guiding an excellent cast. Hoffman with a mother-lode of "Best Actor" awards. Moving and gripping Gordon 30 July This film is about the research of Truman Capote on a murder case. He bonds with a murderer during the visits in prison.
The most striking feature about this film is the acting of Philip Seymour Hoffman. He completely transforms himself into a completely different person. His distinctively high speaking tone and a camp persona must have been the result of a lengthy and hard process of practice. The plot is somewhat predictable, a little slow in the beginning but picks up towards the end.
The scene where Truman Capote has to tell Perry that he is in fact a friend with a motivation is memorable. Everything in this scene is excellent, from the acting, direction and lighting, they all fit the mood of the scene. The final scenes, which I will not describe, are particularly moving. Kurt Russell was Elvis.
George C. Scott was Patton. The article dealt with the murders of four members of a well-liked family in Kansas. The Clutter's farm house was the scene of bloody carnage, while the first intent was robbery. Capote decides to write his next book based on the murders.
While doing so, the effeminate author develops a close relationship with one of the killers, Perry Smith played by Clifton Collins Jr. Hoffman delivers an excellent portrayal of Capote. Mark Pellegrino plays Smith's partner in crime Richard Hickock. Jack Dunphy, Capote's "special friend" is played by Bruce Greenwood. Some very violent images makes for an "R" rating. This movie well deserves every honor it garners.
Capote is a biographical film about Truman Capote, following the events during the writing of Capote's non-fiction book In Cold Blood. It was based on Gerald Clarke's biography Capote. In , Truman Capote was a critically acclaimed novelist who had earned a small degree of celebrity for his work when he read a short newspaper item about a multiple murder in a small Kansas town.
For some reason, the story fascinated Capote, and he asked William Shawn, his editor at The New Yorker, to let him write a piece about the case. Capote had long believed that in the right hands, a true story could be molded into a tale as compelling as any fiction, and he believed this event, in which the brutal and unimaginable was visited upon a community where it was least expected, could be just the right material.
Capote traveled to Kansas with his close friend Harper Lee, herself becoming a major literary figure with the success of To Kill a Mockingbird, and while Capote's effete and mannered personal style stuck out like a sore thumb in Kansas, in time he gained the trust of Alvin Dewey, the Kansas Bureau of Investigation agent investigating the murder of the Clutter family, and with his help Capote's magazine piece grew into a full- length book. Capote also became familiar with the petty criminals who killed the Clutter family, Dick Hickock and Perry Smith, and in Smith he found a troubling kindred spirit more like himself than he wanted to admit.
After attaining a sort of friendship with Smith under the assumption that the man would be executed before the book was ever published, Capote finds himself forced to directly confront the moral implications of his actions with regards to both his role in the man's death, and the way that he would be remembered.
The almost perfectly realized Capote -- stumbling only in the lack of shading it gives Keener's and Greenwood's characters -- offers a sobering glimpse at what the author had to give up of his soul to achieve his success. Philip Seymour Hoffman's riveting central performance guides a well-constructed retelling of the most sensational and significant period in author Truman Capote's life. This is definitely a must-see movie.
Florid Wrappers tedg 10 March I hold certain films to a higher standard than others. We have others that spin up wheels of competence in representing life but seem to lack any understanding of life itself. So I am profoundly disappointed by this. Yes, it has a good actor exercising the opportunity to be the center of a world that we see only through his eyes.
I've followed him from "Twister," where he made that story all about himself by his quiet control from the corner. And the thing does work in the way we obsess about celebrities, and revel in their quirks but only so long as we can understand those quirks and manage them in ourselves. But the thing about this is how the world is delivered by an artist, how pieces of it can be sectioned out and packaged.
What we see is the wrapper only, usually. Capote was all about wrappers where other writers -- the best ones -- are about the selection and sectioning of pieces. So okay, movies are about wrappers too, because the best of them are self-aware and that self-awareness is about how they wrap life for us.
Capote was a cinematic writer, the first one unless you count Hunter Thompson. He'd impose florid visions on a substrate of ordinary life and sculpt a shape on those visions that made it seem as if the underlying matter of life had that shape.
He imposed style on fate, and gave us a whole new generation of possibilities for writers, mostly useless of course. This is important stuff, the stuff of which you could make a great movie, especially if you have a team who understands.
And Hoffman surely does understand this. Even in his most undisciplined moments like "Love Liza" he built a layer of wrapping and simultaneously pierced it. Its what I call folded acting, giving us two layers.
Now look at this movie. It is all wrapper, all style. It is a romance in the sense that you can slickly move your mind over the lubricated latex skin of the thing and never touch anything real. No nerves, muscle, juice. There's the wrapper of the killer's world. Of the book Capote wrapped around that. Of the persona Capote wrapped around it in his fabricated person. Of the book Gerald Clarke wrapped around all of that. At each layer, these artists gave us means to touch the reality within.
Now we come to the fifth wrapper, the one of the movie. And it seals off all the reality. Was the hanging supposed to be that piercing? The snubbing of "Mockingbird? Can any defender of this film claim so?
Ask yourself what effect it had on you when Capote withdrew to Spain? Was it any different to you than when he withdrew to Manhattan? It was in all the other wrappers, because it withdrew the needles. No needles here folks. Move along, nothing to see. Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching. Director Bennet Miller's "Capote" is a film that shows great intelligence in the way it captured the essence of Truman Capote, a man who achieved fame and notoriety with most of the fiction he wrote. This film concentrates in the period of his life in which he got obsessed by a notorious murder case of the fifties about the murder of a family in Kansas.
Capote befriends both men, and is particularly drawn to the sensitive and artistic Perry. Both films were good, but in different ways. Capote is a classy production with a classy performance by Philip Seymour Hoffman, who really brings out the genius and the narcissism in the titular character.
Comparatively, Infamous is lighter and flashier. Toby Jones is a more flamboyant, less subtle Capote who is portrayed as a shameless gossip with the high society women in New York. As good as Jones was, the edge goes to Hoffman in my opinion. Catherine Keener and Sandra Bullock both make fairly good Harper Lees — but again, Keener is more subtle whereas Bullock is more in-your-face. Not to say that makes her a weaker Harper, just a different one, though this was probably attributable more to the script than the actresses.
Nevertheless, I thought Capote handled this crucial part of the story better than Infamous did. In Capote , you really get a sense of the struggle Capote is facing — he clearly feels something for Perry though exactly what that feeling is is left rather ambiguous but he also knows he must finish his masterpiece — and that obsession, vanity and selfishness eventually gets the better of him.
Ultimately, Capote is more serious and reserved, much like the performance of Philip Seymour Hoffman. I stumbled across your site and in particular, your well written and interesting take on these two films. Like you, I had similar feelings about them, from the supporting roles to choices in casting, and in my case I actually saw the films backwards — meaning I saw Capote first and Infamous second.
This was due primarily because of Phillip Seymour Hoffman who truly is one of the finest actors working today. He made the leap from obscure, theater actor and director to art-film standout to feature-film star in quick succession and rightfully so. Over all solid points and criticism through; I agree Daniel Craig was an odd casting choice, and while Infamous is well done in the final assessment it is obvious Capote is a superior film. Hey thanks for visiting. But, I feel if both movies were released at the same time as they were scheduled to, Hoffman would not have won the Oscar.
Infamous was shelved for a year to avoid director competition. You only see one side of Truman when portrayed by Hoffman…the serious brooding type.
Yet here he largely saved himself from himself, and created this near-masterpiece. Topics Film Truman Capote features. Reuse this content.
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