Infamous
Movie Review: Infamous
Truman Capote (Toby Jones) decides to investigate the murder of the Clutter family. When the killers are found, he solicits their story for his masterpiece novel, developing a relationship with them along the way. Meanwhile, his literary friends listen to his pretentious stories about his experience.
Right away the film is more fun because it opens with a snappy nightclub performance. At least there’s some life. Fake interviews with the actors playing Capote’s friends don’t really work. It’s not a documentary. They’re not remembering real memories. They’re reciting somebody’s else’s memories, and they just make the story longer, like two hours is the quota for serious movies. But even the folksy musical score keeps a livelier pace than the solemn Capote.
Jones’ Capote seems a bit more real to me. Maybe because he’s really, really short, or maybe because his voice was even more annoying, or maybe just because I knew Philip Seymour Hoffman before his Capote, I just felt like this weirdo was more of a real weirdo.
I had a harder time buying Sandra Bullock with a southern accent. No fault of hers, I’m sure. I just can’t conceive of that boisterous voice as a delicate southern belle. Daniel Craig is a much different Perry Smith. He’s more mature, more intellectual, more dangerous. That’s an interesting distinction.
Infamous also shows more of Capote’s world outside of this murder case. There’s more gossipy speculation amongst his friends. There are more social scenes that really have nothing to do with the story. The art house gang doing The Twist shows that they exist in the real world, but has no bearing on the case.
The comic relief didn’t make me laugh out loud like some of the other arthouse press at the screening, but I did appreciate that it wasn’t somber, somber, somber the whole time. Capote’s repeated confusion for a woman, and the fact that it doesn’t really bother him, give some dimension to him beyond just pretentious snob. He’s a self-confident eccentric who embraces his uniqueness. He even dresses more flamboyantly in this movie.
There’s more of a world to the prison with more interaction with the other convicts in nearby cells. There seems to be more of a struggle to make Smith talk. This version suggests more compassion, even a relationship between Capote and Smith.
What it ultimately adds up to is a slightly different technique to tell the exact same story. Sort of like the Psycho remake. Different actors, an extra sexual act but the exact same sequence of events. It still requires you to give a rat’s ass about Truman Capote and one of his seven books, which I don’t.
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