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Capote (The Movie)

7:34 PM Monday, November 7, 2005

[in the DNA of every cell, the capacity for homicide]

A few evenings ago I saw the movie "Capote" with a friend. Emerging from the theater, I thought "What the heck was that about?" (OK, I didn't think, "heck" but you get the idea.) Now I think maybe I've figured out what it was all about. Yeah, yeah, there were many themes including journalistic ethics, the rejection of gay men (and lesbians, bisexuals, and the transgendered) by mainstream society, the shallowness of some people caught up in their narcissistic bullshit, an appeal to be non-judgmental, the reality or illusion of friendship, and (I suppose) the stark emptiness of the Great Plains landscape. But those were secondary themes. In the movie there was great acting, with Philip Seymour Hoffman playing Truman Capote and Catherine Keener, who normally plays a highly sex-charged female role, this time being sisterly as the author of To Kill a Mockingbird. (In real life, the real author of that book was indeed a friend of the 20th Century writer Truman Capote.) In the movie, there was killing, and not mockingbirds but people: a whole Midwestern family, and another person towards the end.

And that, say I, was the point of the movie. I believe that every human carries, in the DNA of every cell, the capacity for homicide. And that, say I, explains Truman Capote's fascination with cold-blooded killers, which led to his literary masterpiece, In Cold Blood, following which his writing career petered out and he died in 1984 after years of alcoholism. Capote was raised in the southern USA, primarily in the homes of cousins, after almost being aborted in utero, and then rejected by both biological parents. In the film he repeatedly makes promises of friendship and unwavering support to a suspect in the Kansas mass killing. Did he repeatedly hear similar promises, in his childhood, from his mother and father? Did he accept the emotional sincerity of the promises (the best of intentions), while knowing that they would not be kept? Did he have the expectation that his incarcerated "friend" would react the same way? If so, was he right?

A brilliant writer, a gutsy, campy out-of-the-closet homosexual in the 1940's (!), author of Breakfast at Tiffany's (remember the landmark Audrey Hepburn movie and the character of Holly Golightly?), Truman Capote was both hero and scoundrel. Though not a fast-paced action film, "Capote" is a good flick. Two thumbs up from the Coffeeblogger. Go see it.

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