A sangre fría

In the year 2006, "In Cold Blood"-a riveting thriller from 1967-has two new interesting contexts that it did not previous have. First, and most chillingly, is the fact that it's star, Robert Blake, was recently on trial for murdering his wife. Second, the recent Oscar winning biopic, "Capote" showed the muddled back story of this haunting true crime tale's author, Truman Capote. These two new twists make the film timely for a modern audience.

As a stand alone film from it's era, "In Cold Blood" is top notch in every way. Most notable is the stunning black and white cinematography from Conrad Hall (later of "American Beauty" and "Road to Perdition" fame). Many of the stills from this film of the Kansas farm house at night or the tree-lined back country roads could be sold as fine art photography. Combined with the cracker-jack direction from Brooks and superb editing in the early scenes (where we see the mundane daily life of the innocent family about to be senselessly slaughtered beautifully intertwined with the plotting of the two hapless killers), a rich brooding atmosphere is created that sets the stage for riveting suspense (even when everyone knows how this is all going to end due to the fact its all based on real life events). It's also great to see in this day and age how brilliantly staged a harrowing murder scene can be depicted where the graphic nature of the act is transmitted to the viewer subliminally with nary a drop of blood shown on screen.

The film is also anchored nicely by Robert Blake's eerie performance as the more sympathetic yet senselessly brutal side of the killing duo. The flashback scenes to his horrible childhood are extremely well done. Then there is the scene towards the end of the film where he is speaking to the reverend before being sent to the gallows and he makes his last "confession" so to speak. It's one of those classic movie moments that is a perfect marriage of gritty acting, superb writing, flawless direction, and haunting photography. I dare you to erase from your mind the stark image of the rain's reflection from the window flowing down Robert Blake's pallid face in lieu of actual tears.

The only thing hampering "In Cold Blood" is the slow moving middle act where the killers are on the lam and the forced nature of the social commentary at the end. The tacked-on political message about the death penalty is secondary to its compelling depiction of the mad killers and their prey.

Many films are derived from novels and, in the normal way, it is unhelpful to compare the movie with the book, for the obvious reason that they are distinct art-forms, constrained by different technical limitations. However, this one really does have to be understood in the context of the book which engendered it.

Capote's book is a factual account of a multiple murder in a small Kansas town. Two young drifters plan a robbery which misfires and ends in violence. The book traces the course of the patient investigation which eventually brings the killers to justice. Because the book is a species of journalism, uncompromisingly anchored in fact, the film cannot help but follow suit, with the added burden that it must faithfully represent on the screen real persons, places and events.

The mean lives of Dick Hickock and Perry Smith are documented in stark monochrome. Panavision is used to powerful effect to show the wide, flat spaces of Kansas. Quincy Jones's atmospheric jazz score adds salt to the bleak images. The austerity of blue collar life in the Mid West of the 1950's is splendidly evoked as our two delinquents move through a rolling montage of Travelodges and diners, launderettes and interstates.

This is a film of straight lines. The flat, relentless landscape of Kansas generates horizons that are ruler-straight. Roads stretch into the distance without the hint of a curve. Slat blinds cast harsh bars of light across room interiors. The penitentiary scene is a symphony of geometric lines. Hickock and Smith have had their characters forged by incarceration, and we see that their 'outside' lives are, in a real sense, another form of imprisonment. The lines which enclose them denote the hopelessness of their existence.

The starkness is reinforced by neat, economical editing. The throwing of a light switch in the Hickock farmhouse carries us to the Clutter home, where a light is being turned on, and the words 'any crowded street' whisk us into just such a street. A cigarette butt is discarded, and its ugly cylinder becomes an electromagnet searching for the murder weapon. The Clutters' cleaner realises that a radio has been stolen, and we see the radio playing at Dick's bedside.

Once under arrest, Dick makes a powerful speech about tattoos. The detectives are trying to provoke him by sneering at his 'body art' and he points out that we all carry tattoos of some kind. Our dress, speech and attitudes mark us indelibly and fix us in our time and place.

Herb Clutter and his family lead a spartan home life. The farmhouse is spare and unadorned, but its order and solidity make a sharp contrast with the chaos and squalor of the rented rooms where Dick and Perry hole up. Dick 'hangs paper' (passes dud cheques) in respectable Kansas stores, amassing clothes and electrical goods on a spree which exploits the trust between vendor and consumer and uses it as a weapon - Dick and Perry's revenge upon 'decent' America.

Once the arrests have been made and a trial scheduled, the film switches to a voice-over narration. No doubt this was done in order to shorten the custody passage (this is extensive in the book, but does not lend itself readily to film treatment), but it jars. Up to this point, Hickock and Smith have told their story through action. Narration is second-best.

However, the film is a highly-reliable rendition of the book, and contains some impressive touches. Mail bags come somersaulting from the hurtling express-train like so much tumbleweed. The rapid crossfire of the detectives' press conference conveys a lot of important information to the viewer in an economical way. A detective talks us through a psychological profile of the as yet unknown killers, and it is very persuasive. While our two heroes are lying low in Mexico, a beautiful mariachi song accompanies a bedroom scene, the music evoking a sense of loss and regret, and leading naturally to Perry's flashback memories of his mother's degradation.

To ask if the film is as good as the book is meaningless, but it is certainly a highly-commendable reworking of the book in visual terms. The interplay between the two delinquents is first-class, the easy charm of Dick giving way at critical moments to naked fear of the inscrutable dreamer Perry.

Truman Capote allegedly read a brief article in the New York Times describing the killing of the Clutter family in Kansas and shortly afterward visited the scene of the crime with author Harper Lee (who eventually lived off considerable royalties from "To Kill a Mockingbird".) I remember reading "In Cold Blood" in my teen years when I was considering working for the FBI as a field agent. Then and now I have always been fascinated by crimes that allegedly defy explanation: "senseless killings". But what enraptured me was Capote's considerable gifts as a writer and story teller. His work as both a short story writer and novelist has consistently been underrated and under appreciated. Two years after the publication of Capote's book, Richard Brooks (who had adapted and directed the film version of Tennessee Williams' "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" and had also collaborated with John Huston on the screenplay of "Key Largo") brought Capote's "In Cold Blood" to stark life in the movie theaters. While I am always somewhat hesitant to see my favorite novels and plays transferred to film (since they invariably lack the power and verve of the original), I had always wanted to see "In Cold Blood", but it is a film rarely shown on television. It is a powerful film, rightly shot in black and white and often evoking the "film noir" feel of the 40's and 50's. Robert Blake steals the film, as he should in this role, as the moody and tortured Perry. We see his life unfold both linearly and through a series of flashbacks, developing an understanding of how a sociopath's life might be formed. He is accompanied on this haphazard and fruitless journey by Dick, played brilliantly by Scott Wilson (who had just previous to this film played the murder suspect in "In the Heat of the Night" with Poitier and Steiger). But, of course, as with any great film, this movie is replete with supporting actors who are consistently strong throughout the picture. Charles McGraw, who plays Perry's father, almost steals the picture with his seven-minute scene as he lapses into a reverie of Perry's drunken sex-crazed mother and his love and supposed devotion to his young son. Another notable from the supporting cast is Gerald O'Loughlin as one of the detectives in hot pursuit of the suspects. One of the true highlights of the picture is the underlying musical score composed by the brilliant Quincy Jones, who had already scored several films prior to this one, but it was certainly 1967 which put Jones on Hollywood's musical map for back-to-back tour de force scoring of "In the Heat of the Night" and "In Cold Blood". Some may find that the voice-over narration toward the conclusion of the film verges on the heavy-handed in the implication of the fruitlessness of capital punishment, but Gallup polls of the mid-sixties reveal that 82% of Americans were not in favor of the death penalty, so, for the Zeitgeist of the era, the commentary fits well. For anyone who appreciates film noir, first-rate cinematography, quality musical scoring, and superb acting, "In Cold Blood" is a must-see film.

Imagine turning out the lights in your remote farmhouse on a cold night, and then going to bed. There's no need to lock the doors. The only sound is the wind whistling through the trees. Sometime after midnight a car with lights off inches up the driveway. Moments later an intruder beams a flashlight into your darkened living room.

What makes this image so scary is the setting: a remote farmhouse ... at night. Based on Truman Capote's best-selling book, and with B&W lighting comparable to the best 1940's noir films, "In Cold Blood" presents a terrifying story, especially in that first Act, as the plot takes place largely at night and on rain drenched country roads. It's the stuff of nightmares. But this is no dream. The events really happened, in 1959.

Two con men with heads full of delusions kill an entire Kansas family, looking for a stash of cash that doesn't exist. Director Richard Brooks used the actual locations where the real-life events occurred, even the farmhouse ... and its interior! It makes for a memorable, and haunting, film.

Both of the lead actors closely resemble the two real-life killers. Robert Blake is more than convincing as Perry Smith, short and stocky with a bum leg, who dreams of finding Cortez' buried treasure. Scott Wilson is almost as good as Dick Hickock, the smooth-talking con artist with an all-American smile.

After their killing spree, the duo head to Mexico. Things go awry there, so they come back to the U.S., stealing cars, hitchhiking, and generally being miserable as they roam from place to place. But it's a fool's life, and the two outlaws soon regret their actions. The film's final twenty minutes are mesmerizing, as the rain falls, the rope tightens, and all we hear is the pounding of a beating heart.

Even with its somewhat mundane middle Act, "In Cold Blood" stages in riveting detail a real-life story that still hypnotizes, nearly half a century later. It's that setting that does it. Do you suppose people in rural Kansas still leave their doors unlocked ... at night?

Remarkable, disturbing film about the true-life, senseless, brutal murder of a small-town family, along with the aftermath, and examination of the lives of the killers, Dick Hickok and Perry Smith.

No matter how much time goes by, or how dated this film may look, it still resonates the utter incomprehensibility of criminal acts such as this.

This really traces multiple tragedies: The tragedy, brutality and senselessness of the murder of the Clutter family, a decent farm family in small-town Holcomb, Kansas; and the wasted, brutal and sad lives of Hickok and Smith.

An interesting point is made in the film: that neither of these two immature, scared, petty criminals would have ever contemplated going through with something like this alone. But, together, they created a dangerous, murderous collective personality; one that fed the needs and pathology of each of them. They push each other along a road of "proving" something to each other. That they were man enough to do it, to carry it out; neither wants to be seen as too cowardly to complete their big "score"; an unfortunate and dangerous residue of the desolate lives they led. These were two grown-up children, who live in a criminal's world of not backing down from dares; who constantly need to prove manhood and toughness. in this instance, these needs carried right through to the murder of the Clutters.

The film contains a somewhat sentimentalized look at the Clutter family, but the point is made. These were respected, law-abiding, small-town people, who didn't deserve this terrifying fate. The movie also gives us a sense of the young lives of Hickok and Smith. Perry Smith, whose early life was filled with security and love, but watched in horror as alcohol took his family down a tragic path. Hickok, poor and left pretty much to his own devices, not able to see how he fit in, using his intelligence and charm to con everyone he came into contact with.

An interesting, and maybe the first, look at capital punishment, and what ends we hope to achieve. Is this nothing more than revenge killing for a murder that rocked a nation at a time when we had not yet had to fully face that there might be such predators among us, or does putting these guys at the end of a rope truly provide a deterent to the childish and brutal posturing of men like these? Is it possible to deter men who live lives of deceit, operating under the radar, believing they fool everyone they come into contact with? To be deterred, you must believe it's possible you will be caught. Is it possible to deter these men who believe they are too clever to be caught?; who have committed hundreds of petty crimes, and got away with them? This was supposed to be a "cinch", "no witnesses".

When caught, Hickok finds he can't charm and con the agents the way he had department store clerks. Smith, who believes he deserves such a fate anyway, who seemed to be the only one who truly grasped the gravity of what they had done, willingly tells the story when he learns that Hickok has cowardly caved in. Hickok blinked first. A silly game of chicken between two immature, emotionally damaged, dangerous men.

Fascinating psychological thriller, telling a story of a horrendous crime in this nation's history. Stunning portrayals by Robert Blake and Scott Wilson. These roles made their careers.