There but for the grace of God...

Rating: 8/10 (25 February 2006)

This is a riveting movie about the dark side of human nature. Why was Truman Capote so drawn to the multiple, apparently senseless killings in rural Kansas? All the reviewers miss this deep meaning, but I can tell you the deep dark secret, never mentioned, but inescapable is--- THERE BUT FOR THE GRACE OF GOD GO I.
Capote identifies with the killers, especially Perry, who is also from the south, also abandoned by his mother and ultimately raised in an orphanage, where we presume he had the usual care, abuse and neglect. Capote had a similar abandoning mother ("we were both abandoned by our mothers"), but at least had the saving grace of being raised by a relative, an aunt. Probably his childhood had a modicum of love and security, but just the bare minimum, as Capote can identify with 'cold blood.' He also identified with Perry's creativity, as he was literate and artistic. After hearing Perry's childhood story, he said, "we were raised in the same house, and one day you went out the back door and I went out the front." This was the most telling moment in understanding their connection.
In a way, Capote was as cold-blooded as Perry, using him to write the story that would make him famous and earn him a goldmine. He was shown to have two faces, the sympathetic one toward Perry, gaining his trust and finally getting the details of the killing to end his book, and the other, the egomaniacal entertainer at Manhattan parties. He went from eccentric to an out of control alcoholic, but he was always discreet, never getting falling down drunk, but always sipping a drink. His writer friends were concerned for him but there was nothing they could do, nothing anyone could do.
The closing credits said he died in 1984 from the complications of alcoholism, but Ebert wrote that he died of an overdose. I figure he ultimately could not live with himself or his memories, knowing that just under the surface, he was a cold blooded murderer too.
And such is the human condition, that some emerge from a traumatic childhood and become an overt monster, and some emerge from a traumatic childhood, an eccentric celebrity, fiendishly brilliant, and a covert monster.
Audiences will be drawn to this by the millions and will be affected by viewing this, because all of us have a dark side. We can identify and there but for the grace of God go I!