Capote "2005"
Directed by Bennet Miller

"Until one morning in mid-November of 1959, few Americans - in fact, few Kansans - had ever heard of Holcomb. Like the waters of river, like the motorists on the highway, and like the yellow trains streaking down the Santa Fe tracks, drama, in the shape of exceptional happenings, had never stopped there." (from In Cold Blood)

Capote is a movie set in the late 1950's in mostly rural Kansas and a town that has just had a brutal murder of a family. Capote is a move about Truman Capote , author of "In Cold Blood" and "Breakfast at Tiffinays" It details Truman Capote's life as his investigates and studies the killers and actually befriends one.

To begin this review I feel it entirely necessary to start with Phillip Seymor Hoffman . He lost 40 lbs for this movie and while he usually doesn't look like he has 40 to lose(maybe 20), he doesn't look deathly skinny. His normal voice is usually low but you won't hear any of that in this movie as Hoffman portrays a gay intellectual. His voice is a little high pitched and it took a little bit getting used to. His performance is excellent. Truman Capote was known as the life of the party and Hoffman does these scenes perfectly. Not a single part of his performance was flawed.

The direction of this movie was very minimal with lots of still shots of the country side. Not a whole lot of eye candy but well done nonetheless. It was shot in 36 days which is a short amount of time for a movie to be shot, especially a mopvie with 5 academy award nominations. I definently applaud the fact that Miller was able to get non-actors to work well as some of the prison guards in the movie were actual life prison guards. The story flows perfect and there is never a dull moment.

In conclusion I belive that Capote is woth a visit to the theaters and a must rent and one of the best movies for the last quarter of 2005.