Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)

Is it any wonder that Audrey Hepburn was cast to play the beautiful, airy, impish socialite in the film adaptation of the claim to fame of Truman Capote, the socialite of all socialites? Elegant and whimsical, the slender girl with the doe eyes steals the screen in an otherwise mildly unimpressive film.

She is Holly Golightly, a chatterbox and a mess of a human being with no sense of purpose other than the preservation of family. This is flimsy purpose though, for if it wasn't she would have the sense not to drink her money on the rocks or obviously yet unwittingly get herself mixed up with a mobster named Sally Tomato (any other would be fine, just nobody with the last name "Tomato"). The money she scrapes together isn't anything more than a few hundred dollars and never seems to amount to any more than she had the year before.

Life gives her the possibility for change, however, when a soft spoken and handsome young man moves into the room above hers at her apartment complex. Paul Varjak (George Peppard) is a writer and someone unhappy with a mediocre life. He is level headed and not particularly interesting, but his blue eyes and impressive physique should be enough for any woman to love. Indeed, the one thing both he and the spunky Holly have in common is their line of work. Paul is a writer to be sure, but the books aren't selling he pays his rent through the oldest profession in the world.

Neither of them are exactly prostitutes--more of a gold digger and a boy toy. She goes for the ugly, eccentric millionaires, while he keeps up a long term fling with a rich married cougar. What they do doesn't bring them happiness, but we know loving each other will.

Capote is a man of many, many, many words, but I'm not sure how many of them I particularly want to see acted out before me. I have not read Breakfast at Tiffany's, but I have read In Cold Blood, and judging from that I would have to say that Capote knows how to write exceedingly well. The adaptation of his novella here shows the work of an exceedingly well-connected, flamboyantly gay man who likes to listen to himself talk. I could barely understand what was going on for all of the talking that was being done. Unfortunately, this is a film where people talk incessantly but never say anything.

Hepburn is lovely, but I began to tune her out as I watched as she spoke about anything and everything without interruption. This is not a sign of wit, but rather tedious egotism on Capote's and scriptwriter George Axelrod's part. The loose plot that there is does not appear until the halfway mark and until then we are left with nothing but decadence and a whole lot of fluff.

The film is endearingly quirky throughout as is it's lead, but there is so little substance by way of story that these highly developed characters seem to do nothing at all. I should also make a note of one glaring flaw: Mickey Rooney. Holly's landlord is a Chinese man name Mr. Yunioshi, who is portrayed in one of the most abject displays of racism I have ever seen in a movie. Using massive, crooked fake teeth, scrunching up his face and doing a horrible Chinese (?) accent, Rooney bumbles around the set making a fool of himself in an objectionable and embarrassing way. I might be inclined to give the film a higher ranking if this ugly display wasn't apart of the film.

Even still, it's a classic and if you're a Hepburn fan this isn't one to miss.

2/4