Capote (2005)

This isn't In Cold Blood but Truman Capote writing 'In Cold Blood', and it is painterly and utterly captivating in its evocation of the 1960s and in the way it contrasts the cocktail parties, soirees of New York with the bleak landscapes of rural Kansas, its scene of the now infamous Clutter family murders and its penitentiary stretched out across the flat, but the biopic remains frustratingly superficial about its subject, more snapshot than character study, touching upon - for a Capote Devotee maybe - but not wholly taking up - for anyone else - myriad points of interest including Capote's addictions (we just see him with a glass in hand, a mere signal for those in the know), his self-centredness (he cries, but we wonder why; he says he's done all he can (after a holiday in Spain) but we wonder if he actually believes it); the veracity of his journalism (we hear him repeatedly proclaim his near-perfect recall but wonder if it might be because he feels his credibility is/would be challenged); his deteriorating relationship with Harper Lee (she cools but we wonder what affect this has on him), and the freedom he had in his relationship with Jack Dunphy (there are hints at dalliances, and possibly even one with one of the killers, Perry Smith (according to some sources but not this film), but we are left wondering if he feels duplicitous...or anything at all).

★★★☆☆

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Get Out (2017)

Meeting the parents of a partner for the first time is a situation fraught with tension; add issues of race, some sudden loud bangs and some kooky psychological thrills and you'd expect a movie not to be as boring in long stretches as this - part of the problem is it feels unfinished (there are images and scenes from the movie's promotional material which are entirely missing), and the movie's really clever ideas are either cut short too soon (you'll want more time with all of the characters, especially Catherine Keener's hypnotist) or let down with daft plotting (like candlebra in a surgery, or three cops who laugh off a ridiculous story ignoring the Googleable fact of a missing man, or antisocial track and field training in the middle of the night). 

★★★☆☆

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Enough Said (2013)

At around 90 minutes, this comedy is barely longer than a tv show and in fact star Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Eva, a divorced, single parent masseuse who, through a big coincidence, ends up dating the ex-husband of a client, is such great company that when the movie ends you'll wish it were a tv series and the character of Eva one you could catch up with again.

★★★★☆

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Captain Phillips (2013)

The real Captain Phillips can't be blamed that his true story Somali pirate hostage situation, as a movie, descends into a messy, overlong stalemate at the two-third mark due to an extended "in the water" scene that surely can't have occurred as depicted - it should have been cut to keep matters relating to Seat 15 - and the movie - much more gripping.

★★★☆☆

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