Capote

Capote, circa '65-66

Saw "CAPOTE" last night, starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman (whom Greta still claims she swear she passed by on the sidewalk in Convent Gardens, London), and co-starring the also very brilliant Cathrine Keener.

Beings this is probably the greatest piece of literature regarding western Kansas, my neighborhood, I suppose you could say, I was a little discouraged that it was filmed in Winnipeg, Canada. Why not just film it near Holcomb, Kansas, where the Clutter family murders took place? Yet even from the first few scenes, it's pretty clear the filmmakers knew the look they were shooting for, and must have been somewhat familiar with the terrain of western Kansas. I wasn't disappointed, and they accomplished the right "look" of the flat barren plains quite nicely. From the very first passage of the book, which Capote writes, so eloquently

"The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call "out there." Some seventy miles east of the Colorado border, the countryside, with its hard blue skies and desert-clear air, has an atmosphere that is rather more Far West than Middle West."

To me, despite him describing Holcomb alone, this passage best describes western Kansas. He encapsulates the geography and landscape, the setting needed to understand the rest of the novel, all in one passage. Likewise the film does the same in the first few scenes. We know everything there is to know about Holcomb and the scene of the crime. But about the film...

The name Phillip Seymour Hoffman is probably on the lips of just about every film critic by now, in speaking of the annual "Oscar buzz." There's good reason for that, because quite simply, Hoffman has always been a brilliant and versitile actor, no matter what role he steps into. As Truman Capote, he is in top form, and creates one of the best, if not THE best, performance from an actor of the year.

Be it Boogie Nights, Magnolia, Happiness, etc. Hoffman is one of a handful of actors (Pacino, De Niro, Jeff Daniels, John Goodman, just to name a few) who are able to step into the world of the characters they play and inhabit that same realm. Hoffman does so in Capote, so much that he does one of the best disappearing acts of the yet. By the end of the film, Hoffman's prescence seems to have coalesced into the Capote the man, and the line between them has been deliberately blurred by Hoffman's mastery of Capote's mannerisms, quirks, and utter desperation to write his novel, despite the ever-looming execution of the convicted Perry Smith, a man whom he loves more than he respects only so that he can see through to the ending of his novel. Great actors don't have to try. They can simply just be, and create a remarkable performance. To Hoffman's credit, and inevitable Oscar win, Capote is his finest performance to date, and the best of the year.

Catherine Keener is also quite good as Capote's lifelong friend/sidekick/research assistant/fellow writer Harper Lee, who, of course, wrote "To Kill A Mockingbird." A funny moment comes during the film premiere of "To Kill A Mockingbird," which Capote attends only to bask in admiration. With martini in hand, Lee steps aside from the crowd to confront Capote at the bar, a brief exchange of words, to which Capote concludes, "I don't see what all the fuss is about."

Great direction, a knockout of a screenplay (maybe an Oscar nomination there, too), and of course, amazing performances makes Capote a powerhouse of a film. Greta called it a "cold movie", and I mentioned that it was a very "pensive" film. The actors set an emotional tone for the film, and after the initial hilarity instigated by Capote at the start of the film, it's clear near the end of the film that Capote will not walk away from In Cold Blood, Perry, or Holcomb without his conscious and his life's work being stained by a mix of innocent blood and typerwriter ink.