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by Willie Waffle
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Infamous
Stop me if you have heard
this one before. Toby
Jones stars as writer
Truman Capote as he decides to write his next book about the salacious
and
vicious murder of a well to do Kansas
farmer and his family. A
creature of the
New York social scene, where his wildly eccentric ways are appreciated
as
entertaining and gain him unprecedented access, Capote sets off for the
American heartland to investigate the story. However, the conservative
people
of Kansas aren’t quite sure what to make of him, and are
loathe to
cooperate.
Can Capote get the
information he needs to write the story?
Will he ever be the same after he meets the killers
and strikes up a
relationship with them?
You might be wondering why
anyone did a second Truman Capote movie after last year’s Capote, which earned
an Oscar for star Philip Seymour Hoffman, was so well received, dealt with the
same period of time, and is still fresh in the minds of people who might be
tempted to see Infamous. Well, that’s
what happens when two Hollywood studios end up
with the same idea for the same movie.
Someone has to go first, and the folks with Capote got their movie out
there and it was good, while everyone associated with Infamous spends a
lifetime shaking like Mel Gibson getting the DT’s in rehab every time the
comparisons start.
However, Infamous has a
great deal going for it. Jones is very
good as Capote, and that’s no easy task.
In a way, Capote was a real life cartoon figure with a distinctive voice,
diminutive stature and tornado-like personality and charm. He’s the kind of person who is starving for
attention (something very well explained in the script by Douglas McGrath,
based on the book by George Plimpton), and finds ways to get it by any means
necessary, which makes Jones’s performance so easy to appreciate. He keeps Capote interesting and just
outrageous enough without going over the top for most of the movie, but truly
excels as Infamous gets more serious. We
see him as a sad, pitiable figure, but also one who always seems to have his
own interests in mind, and Jones walks that weird line between likable and
detestable.
It’s the last half of Infamous that makes it a movie worth going to see. Early on, director Douglas McGrath seems to
have trouble finding the right tone for the film. Yes, he wants to show us the differences
between Truman’s New York life and what is
happening in Kansas,
but Infamous becomes too comical and unfocused for its own good. Also, he has several characters act as if
they are being interviewed, a la VH1’s Best Week Ever, but sloppily drops the
technique, only to pick it up later when we already have all of the info we
need, and the extra insight doesn’t seem to matter. Just let us follow the story!
Jones is very good, as well
as Daniel “I’m going to be James Bond” Craig as killer Perry Smith – someone
just as manipulative as Capote, but also a remorseful monster who has a complex
nobility and dignity about him (as much as you can have for a guy who shot 4
people in cold blood). If you can make
it through the first half, the last half is an excellent film.
If you can make
it through the first half, the last half of Infamous is an excellent film.
2 ½ Waffles (Out Of 4)
Copyright
2006 - WaffleMovies.com
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