ridiculous rating

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

There's something about older movies like this and "A Streetcar Named Desire" that feels real. I don't know if it's the way the films are shot, if it's the acting, or if it's the black-and-white color-scheme. Whatever it is, I like it, and I want more of it. Covering a truly disturbing crime like the Clutter murders, and going so far as to film in the house where they were murdered is an insane attention to detail. That's something I'd expect Kubrick to do, it just adds another layer of terror. The acting is incredible, these don't feel like actors playing people, it feels like they are the people, if that makes sense. Even though their crime is deplorable, the movie does a great job of making them relatable. You feel like this whole thing could've been avoided had things gone differently.

'In Cold Blood' is a film written and directed by Richard Brooks whose story is based on the non-fiction novel of the same name written by Truman Capote. The story involves two ex-convicts Perry Smith and Richard 'Dick' Hickock played by Robert Blake and Scott Wilson respectively. They hatch up a plan to rob the Clutters, a wealthy family in Kansas. But during the robbery they find that there is no safe filled with cash and in the heat of the moment they end up gruesomely murdering the entire family. The film follows them on the run as the police try their best to get to the bottom of the crime. Now I don't have much idea about the actual crime and the actual people involved with it. So this review will be solely based on my impression of these people from the film which in turn is based on Truman Capote's impression of the events.I loved how the film starts. The director intermixes the scenes involving Perry and Dick along with the scenes showing the Clutters in their home. This works and acts like a foreshadow for the inevitable brutality that is going to follow. I couldn't help but feel a bit heartbroken to see the scenes involving the Clutters already knowing at the back of my mind, their eventual fate. The director hints at the existing financial inequality in society. He underlines the fact that as long as the imbalance in society exists, crimes like this will go on forever and ever and no one can do anything about it. Families and people will continue to remain vulnerable to evil forces borne out of dissatisfaction. Another very important and interesting aspect of the film is the unpredictability of human nature. Richard Brooks does give you hints and indications as to what triggered the two convicts (Perry in particular) to do what they did by giving you some details of their past lives and their childhood, but in the end Brooks wants you to know that some crimes just take place out of nowhere without much explanation to support it. Human beings with unstable minds and unstable psyches can be capable of the ultimate form of evil. Interestingly, this aspect of the unpredictability of crime is also covered in Bennett Miller's 'Foxcatcher'. It's interesting because Bennett Miller is also the director of 'Capote', the film which follows Truman Capote in his quest to acquire more and more information on this murder of the Clutters while he was working on his book 'In Cold Blood' which serves as the source material for the script of this film.I thought the middle act of the film was a bit uninteresting. It had nothing to do with the pace, it just involved scenes that didn't match the quality of the rest of the film. The procedural element of the film is the only thing of the narrative that I wasn't a big fan of and this is what fills up the middle act. The acting is solid from everyone involved, with bits of over acting in some scenes which is expected as we were still in the 60s and over the top acting had still not completely left Hollywood. The direction and screenplay is brilliant. The recreation of the crime scenes was absolutely brilliant. There are some jump-cuts from one scene to another and the transition was seamless. The last 30 minutes of the film is directed meticulously. The music by Quincy Jones basically revolves around elements of jazz and blues. The music in the film is beautiful to listen to on its own, but at times I found it to be a bit jarring and inappropriate in certain scenes and at times a bit too loud. 'In Cold Blood' isn't a perfect film, but it is certainly a good account of a gruesome crime. It is well directed, it has elements of both procedural films as well as road films. It just shows that no matter who you are or what you do, you are always vulnerable. The American Dream is ideal, but it is not beyond the grasps of evil forces.

After a botched robbery results in the brutal murder of a rural family, two drifters elude police, in the end coming to terms with their own mortality and the repercussions of their vile atrocity.Let us single out Scott Wilson. This great actor seems to have gone most of his life without recognition, being best known now for "The Walking Dead" rather than anything else he has done. Robert Blake got huge, but despite this movie and appearing on the cover of Life magazine, Wilson seems to have stayed obscure. That is a travesty.I love that the film is in black and white. By the late 1960s, this was (I believe) less common than it had been only a few years before. But it makes it edgier, and also timeless. Color has a year attached, as color technology changes. But black and white can be any time, while still maintaining a very 1950s feel.

HAVING BEEN MADE so long, long ago, IN COLD BLOOD (1967) lacks the extremely graphic violence that became a hallmark of the crime drama in the 1970s. In the period before the likes of BONNIE & CLYDE, THE GODFATHER and the actioners of guys like Clint Eastwood and Charles Bronson, imagination and good acting were still being applied in liberal amounts.SOME HAVE COMPLAINED about this film (and all others) not having been filmed in color. Those who hold this opinion generally equate Technicolor with quality film making. To those folks, Black & White is strictly old hat; being a relic of the old days.AS FAR AS this particular production's use of the Black & White, it was the correct choice. For a story that deals with such unbelievable occurrences and characters of such incredible, inhuman behavior needs to be done up in a particularly appropriate darkness. In every sense of the word, the film is dark, truly an example of "Noir"; even though it is based on a real incident.ALTHOUGH THE HORRORS of the perpetration of the mass murder of a rural family is the central element which drives the narrative, special attention to revealing the psychotic personalities possessed by the two killers. THe story is crafted in such a manner as to build a solid background (foundation) to the incidents that transformed what would have been a robbery for monetary gain in to an atrocity of totally insane commission and lacking any motive, other than inflicting pain and sorrow on others for no reason.THE CAST CONSISTING of Robert Blake & Scott Wilson as the killers, along with Paul Stewart, John Forsythe, Charles McGraw, Ruth Storey, Brenda Curin, Jeff Corey and many others, did a fine job in presenting an essentially downer of a film. There is no other way to spin such a tale.AT ITS CONCLUSION the story is a sort of morality play. Through Paul Stewart's character, questions asked about the whole case, from beginning to end. The questions are said from one character to another, yet they are meant for all of us. How do we prevent such unspeakable atrocities? How do we deal with the dispensing of "Justice?" WE DO RECALL SEEING author of the book IN COLD BLOOD, Truman Capote as a guest on The Johnny Carson TONIGHT Show. This was while the film was in full release nationwide. When asked what conclusions that he had drawn from all of his research of the incident, his reply was blunt and straight forward. Mr. Capote said that it would be far better for all of the nation if an occasional innocent were to be executed, rather than having so many homicidal maniacs roaming about with impunity.WELL SURPRISING, BUT, Way to go "Tru!"