Biographies are hard to successfully transform into movies. They require an impeccable recreation of every relevant fact and an outstanding cast of actors capable of channeling the lives of their characters, both of which can be difficult. Biographies are indeed a challenge, yet Bennett Miller's 'Capote' triumphs.
Set in the 1950s, it explores the life of author Truman Capote (Philip Seymour Hoffman) over the four-year period during which he researched and eventually wrote his most famous piece of work, 'In Cold Blood.'
The movie begins when a four-member family is brutally murdered in Hokum, Kansas. Capote had just written his first novel and was looking for a second project. Intrigued by the Kansas incident, he agreed to conduct an investigation of the murders and to turn his results into an article for The New Yorker magazine. With the help of his longtime friend, Nelle Harper Lee (Catherine Keener), he began his quest by speaking with several townspeople who had been acquainted with the deceased family.
While this was a typically slow start, he soon got his big break. Shortly thereafter, Perry Smith (Clifton Collins Jr.) and Richard Hickcock (Mark Pellegrino) were apprehended, accused of the four murders, found guilty and soon sentenced to death. Capote jumped at this opportunity to further his investigation and boldly chose to interrogate the two men from behind the bars of their maximum-security prison.
Ironically, conversation related directly to the actual murders was avoided. Instead, Capote asked them about their lives outside of the crimes they had committed, and what began as a series of stiff encounters eventually broadened into an unlikely companionship between him and the two men.
Capote's bond was especially close with Smith, with whom he spent the bulk of his investigation interrogating. Capote sympathized with the two men and began to do everything he could to help them overcome their negative press images and unfavorable verdicts. For the numerous court appeals that followed their sentencing, Capote found them good lawyers to try to overturn the verdict.
Though these were unsuccessful attempts until the end, when Smith and Hickock's Supreme Court appeal was denied, Capote used this extended time to continue to meet with Smith, who he had come to identify with. The amount of information gathered from their countless conversations exceeded the needs of the article he had promised to deliver to The New Yorker. Capote soon realized that the results of his investigation were better suited for a novel and, with his editor's permission, he pursued this new challenge.
While there is nothing flawed about 'Capote,' the accuracy with which Hoffman portrays the title character is so dead-on that the effect is almost creepy. Capote was a man with peculiar mannerisms and an even more peculiar, high-pitched voice. The revival of such a complex character is challenging, yet Hoffman channels his character to perfection and delivers a performance worthy of all the Oscar-buzz he has been receiving.
The rest of the cast is also phenomenal. Collins Jr. and Pellegrino portray their convicts with the perfect mix of iced veins and hearts of gold, making it plausible to see them as killers, yet impossible to root against. Keener exudes the Harper Lee with whom Capote was lifelong friends, delivering a flawless performance in which she is his closest friend and strongest alibi, while Bruce Greenwood plays perfectly opposite Capote as his contrasting, yet compatible, partner Jack Dunphy.
Every character in 'Capote' is likeable except for the title character. While the audience finds itself sympathizing with the convicts and admiring the calm with which Lee and Dunphy tackle their relationships with Capote, the man himself is met with an intrigue reserved only for the most eccentric and habitually strange of them all.
As the story unfolds, Capote's unpredictability is delivered in abundance, and part of the film's enjoyment is found in wondering what unusual remark or gesture he will next deliver. 'Capote' turned out as well as it did because of the title character that Hoffman created. Throughout the course of the film, he perfectly illustrated one man's struggle with self-fulfillment and ceaseless conflict in a way that made his story fascinating to watch. Without him, the rest of the film's talents would have gone to waste. He is the driving force behind the success of this production, a film well-worth seeing.
