In Cold Blood (1967)

Hol­comb, Kansas, 1959: a crime has been com­mit­ted that sev­en years lat­er will make Tru­man Capote a name for the ages. In the ​’50s the socialite author was already the toast of New York for wit­ty slim­line nov­els, of which ​‘Break­fast of Tiffany’s’ was the most celebrated.

‘In Cold Blood’, pub­lished in 1966, was to be a dif­fer­ent beast. The huge tome, gleaned from intense con­ver­sa­tions with death-row pris­on­ers, Dick Hick­ock and Per­ry Smith, rein­vent­ed jour­nal­ism and lit­er­a­ture by blend­ing both. It remains one of the most grip­ping books ever pub­lished in Eng­lish, full of the tawdry mag­net­ism of true crime, the lin­guis­tic ele­gance of a mas­ter writer and the human com­plex­i­ty of sub­jects that have been inti­mate­ly observed.

Giv­en that Richard Brooks’ film is adapt­ed and takes its name from Capote’s ​‘In Cold Blood’, it’s strange that the writer/​journalist is pushed to the periph­er­als and renamed as an old­er gent. Still, any­one thirst­ing for more of Truman’s angle has Ben­nett Miller’s excel­lent Capote as a resource. Brooks’ film – like its source – is pri­mar­i­ly fas­ci­nat­ed with the per­pe­tra­tors of the ghast­ly crim­i­nal act.

Per­ry (Robert Blake) and Dick (Scott Wil­son) are a pair of ex-cons. Per­ry is dam­aged. Dick is charm­ing. They’re both remark­ably cav­a­lier about the prospect of mur­der­ing a fam­i­ly of four. The goal is to steal the $10,000 that Dick’s ex-cell­mate claimed was kept in the Clut­ter family’s home safe. And then: Mexico!

Brooks cross-cuts between Per­ry and Dick in their car on the way to Hol­comb and the Clut­ter fam­i­ly going about their busi­ness on the last day of their lives. The Clut­ters are pre­sent­ed as a reg­u­lar, nice fam­i­ly. 16-year-old Nan­cy has a full day ahead of teach­ing younger girls. Keny­on, her broth­er, smokes on the sly. Father, Herb, is onto him but jovial­ly lets it slip. Bon­nie, his wife, is not well, either from ill­ness or nerves. There is a pro­tec­tive­ness over her on this fam­i­ly farm. Brooks does not use any dra­mat­ic con­trivance to make the Clut­ters seem over­ly saint­ly or significant.

There is one breezy exchange that feels omi­nous, not because of height­ened music or deliv­ery but because their fate is already sealed. Nancy’s friend asks if she wants to sleep over. Nan­cy says no, Bobby’s com­ing over. Her friend smiles, says she’ll pick Nan­cy up for church at 9am.

Mean­while, Dick is estab­lish­ing him­self as full of enough easy South­ern charm to rival Matthew McConaugh­ey decades ahead of sched­ule. He’s get­ting liquored up and pro­vid­ing a stream of boy­ish repar­tee. Per­ry is freak­ing out and hav­ing flash­backs to his dis­turbed child­hood. He has the capac­i­ty to kill but is less moti­vat­ed to utilise this than his part­ner. More than any­thing, he is con­fused and low on ideas. Dit­to Dick. The chem­istry that Blake and Wil­son drum up doesn’t have the hard-edge that we’re used to see­ing in big screen rep­re­sen­ta­tions of bru­tal crim­i­nals. Dick and Per­ry are pals and they look after each other.

The remark­able thing about Brooks’ In Cold Blood is that it stays calm. The men arrive at the Clut­ter farm at 2am. Many direc­tors would have been restrained until this point and then gone full gial­lo in depict­ing a blood­bath. Brooks skips to the next morn­ing. Enter anoth­er per­spec­tive: law enforce­ment. We car­ry on get­ting to know Dick and Per­ry, who now have even more nar­ra­tive space to be the leads. It’s impos­si­ble to ful­ly root for them and impos­si­ble to be ful­ly against them.

Brooks strives to make a film about humans: slain humans and slay­er humans. Blake and Wil­son give won­der­ful­ly nat­ur­al per­for­mances: eerie in their casu­al atti­tude to mur­der but endear­ing in their open natures. In Cold Blood doesn’t judge them but doesn’t excuse them. It lets the jus­tice sys­tem do its work, bear­ing wit­ness and even­tu­al­ly show­ing the quadru­ple mur­der which Brooks filmed inside the actu­al Clut­ter house. As it reach­es a close, the film’s trap­door swings open releas­ing not the banal­i­ty of evil but the cold­ness of despair.