I've just seen "Breakfast at Tiffany's" for the first time

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Until I saw this movie all I knew about "Moon River" was that Edith Bunker liked to sing it.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Monday, 19 March 2007 18:01 (nineteen years ago)

I always got that feeling from it as well, that she ran away from her past because she's the kind of person who runs away from things, not that she runs away from situations now because of her past.

But this is true! Both in book and movie form! Oh, that Doc Golightly was always try'na tame some wild thing, like a bird with a broken wing, but all he'd ever manage was to make it stronger so it could leave!

Anyway umm yeah I think expecting her to "run away from situations now because of her past" is a kind of pop-psychology take the story doesn't have -- Holly is a wild rootless thing, she was wild and rootless when Doc Golightly found her, she is wild and rootless from the second page of the book, where the narrator wonders where she's ended up ... the film expectation would be to explain that psychologically ("it's because of her past") and then overcome it in the final five minutes (she stays), but her place in the story is originally fixed as just being that way.

― nabisco, Monday, 19 March 2007 18:04 (nineteen years ago)

Did you see her in "the children's hour"? Also a "daring topic" for its time.

― Wiggy Woo, Monday, 19 March 2007 20:51 (nineteen years ago)

the film expectation would be to explain that psychologically ("it's because of her past") and then overcome it in the final five minutes (she stays), but her place in the story is originally fixed as just being that way.

I guess my problem with the film is, as Hurting says, that the Doc Golightly stuff feels like it's supposed to be offering an explanation, without offering much of a good one. Also, I agree with you. Adurey Hepburn is just too controlled to have been 'wild'. It never slips.

― accentmonkey, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 07:52 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, I even have that problem with Adurey in Funny Face. At least until she finally breaks loose and does her beatnik dance in the cave.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 13:24 (nineteen years ago)

My problem with Funny Face is that she's the one who's supposed to have a funny face, and she's starring opposite Fred Astaire.

― accentmonkey, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:07 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, that too!

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:10 (nineteen years ago)

I wish I could find the thread where s1ocki zinged J.D. with some bad Mr. Yunioshi schtick.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:12 (nineteen years ago)

Actually I think it was me that zinged him.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:13 (nineteen years ago)

But s1ocki said "zing."

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:13 (nineteen years ago)

Actually slocki made the same point on this thread.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:16 (nineteen years ago)

"MISTA RAUTERBACH!"

― Hurting 2, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:18 (nineteen years ago)

A friend of mine swears by Robin and Marian.

― Dr Morbius, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:35 (nineteen years ago)

I can barely watch her in Wait Until Dark. I felt sorry for Alan Arkin's inability to kill her.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 14:43 (nineteen years ago)

I once saw Alan Arkin waiting in line with his family at the Lincoln Center IMAX. He looked glum, as celebs sometimes do in real life, like one of his glummer characters, like his character in Glengarry Glen Ross or his character in Slums Of Beverly Hills after a meeting with his more successful brother Carl Reiner but before thinking of going to The Sizzler. But then again, I've crossed paths with pretty much every actor in that movie.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:13 (nineteen years ago)

Didn't you yell "Serpentine"? or "Help the bombardier"?

― Dr Morbius, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:14 (nineteen years ago)

No, but I thought about it!

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:17 (nineteen years ago)

I can't imagine Alan Arkin NOT looking glum.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:48 (nineteen years ago)

She was pretty bad in "Wait until Dark", I can't deny it.

― Pashmina, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:54 (nineteen years ago)

When she would come on the Oscars in her late 50s looking 85 pounds, I wanted to throw her a sammich.

― Dr Morbius, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 16:02 (nineteen years ago)

I saw the Seinfeld episode recently where George joins the book club and has to read Breakfast at Tiffany's, but instead forces himself into the home of the family who rented it.

― Gukbe, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 16:05 (nineteen years ago)

A conversation between my wife and me concerning Audrey Hepburn:

SS: "I hate Audrey Hepburn!"
PP: "You, you what? How can you hate Audrey Hepburn?"
SS: "Because she gave up that cat in that movie!"
PP: "But it was a movie! In real life, she, like, helped feed hungry children and UNICEF and all that."
SS: "SHE GAVE UP THE CAT."

― Pleasant Plains, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 16:10 (nineteen years ago)

I'm with you, but I don't feel up to playing nabisco and explaining why right now.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 20 March 2007 16:30 (nineteen years ago)

[Removed Illegal Link]

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Saturday, 24 March 2007 20:35 (nineteen years ago)

I Must Protest

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Saturday, 24 March 2007 20:35 (nineteen years ago)

WTF, SS is ass-backward: Audrey ran back and got the cat! Book-Holly abandons that sucker something fierce, setting up one of the better last sentences of a book I've ever come across. (Animal lovers will be happy to hear it gets taken in by a nice family in Harlem or something.)

― nabisco, Saturday, 24 March 2007 22:27 (nineteen years ago)

the cat is pretty much the focal point of the movie for me. well, that and as i've already said: the party scenes (okay, am also a sucker for the very-early-morning nyc walking)

― rrrobyn, Saturday, 24 March 2007 23:07 (nineteen years ago)

five years pass...

It's really not very good.
― Hurting 2, Friday, March 16, 2007 11:44 PM (5 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 13:49 (fourteen years ago)

she's much more tolerable in Charade, where her airheadedness is used as a comic device ("What does all this have to do with the CIO?")

― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 1 April 2012 14:11 (fourteen years ago)

Yeah, "Charade" is the best

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 14:24 (fourteen years ago)

I kept wondering if they made Breakfast at Tiffany's today, would Holly be like some Cobrasnake Kreayshawn MySpace scene kid?

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 14:25 (fourteen years ago)

Mandy Moore as Holly, Peter Saaaaarsgaaard as the Not Gay One, Meryl Streep as the Jap.

― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 1 April 2012 14:30 (fourteen years ago)

I kept wondering if they made Breakfast at Tiffany's today, would Holly be like some Cobrasnake Kreayshawn MySpace scene kid?

No.

― Cuba Pudding, Jr. (jaymc), Sunday, 1 April 2012 15:39 (fourteen years ago)

ok then?

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:09 (fourteen years ago)

its settled

― dayo, Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:11 (fourteen years ago)

i kind of wish i knew some people old enough to see this in 1961, because I'm curious what the general opinion of Mr. Yunioshi was back THEN, unfiltered through 50 years of discussion and deconstruction

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:14 (fourteen years ago)

Anglo actors did broad racial shtick quite frequently then. Then you add in Rooney's subtle instincts.

― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:19 (fourteen years ago)

it's not like it's gone away xp

http://www.hotflick.net/flicks/2007_I_Now_Pronounce_You_Chuck_And_Larry/big/fhd007ICL_Rob_Schneider_007.jpg

― dayo, Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:21 (fourteen years ago)

right, but I think everyone (at least with a brain) agrees that's fucked up in 2012?

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:23 (fourteen years ago)

oh. my. god. xp.

― Waxahachie Swap (Jimmy The Mod Awaits The Return Of His Beloved), Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:24 (fourteen years ago)

sure, I don't think you'll find someone on ilx defending the 'performance'. can't say the same for the rest of the country. xp

― dayo, Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:26 (fourteen years ago)

well, frogbs still posts here iirc

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:28 (fourteen years ago)

Did a quick check of some books, and Sarris, Simon, and Farber turned up nothing in the way of on-the-spot reviews. One sentence from Dwight Macdonald, calling the film "botched." Kael liked Rooney a lot; you can weigh that against her penchant for provocation, especially when it came to political incorrectness, before it had a name. You can get the original Times review online, though: "Mickey Rooney's bucktoothed, myopic Japanese is broadly exotic."

http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=9A05EED9173AE13ABC4E53DFB667838A679EDE

― clemenza, Sunday, 1 April 2012 16:28 (fourteen years ago)

the cat is pretty much the focal point of the movie for me.

The cat is the only non-annoying character. As such, I applaud whoever made this edit, featuring only scenes with the cat in:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai8oArl7qGo

The cat has his own imdb page, by the way: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1248838/bio

― instant coffee happening between us (a passing spacecadet), Sunday, 1 April 2012 19:31 (fourteen years ago)

I kept wondering if they made Breakfast at Tiffany's today, would Holly be like some Cobrasnake Kreayshawn MySpace scene kid?

― #yolo contendere (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, April 1, 2012 10:25 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark

she totes would

― these pretzels are makeing me horney (Hungry4Ass), Sunday, 1 April 2012 19:34 (fourteen years ago)

she'd be a m4rie call0way type right?

― balls, Sunday, 1 April 2012 23:09 (fourteen years ago)

I went to Tiffany's (NY)

Was in the lift. Was gonna ask lift dude if they get many people asking for the cafe/restaurant.

(bottled)

― Mark G, Monday, 2 April 2012 06:04 (fourteen years ago)

two weeks pass...

Love this--via Sullivan, art from people (by Craig Alan, who I take it is not unknown, though he is to me):

http://dellioandwoods.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/audrey2-e1335031249119.jpg http://dellioandwoods.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/audrey1-e1335031225836.jpg

― clemenza, Saturday, 21 April 2012 18:09 (fourteen years ago)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b4/British_Airways_Face_(1989).png
(from his kindergarten years)

― Cheggers Plays Populous (snoball), Saturday, 21 April 2012 18:14 (fourteen years ago)

If you think that's big, then you should see the size of his parent's refrigerator.

― Cheggers Plays Populous (snoball), Saturday, 21 April 2012 18:21 (fourteen years ago)

Skipping 31 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

Don't forget about her earplug/rings!

― (✿◠‿◠) (ENBB), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 21:10 (fourteen years ago)

It's a heartwarming story of manipulative urban whores with some touching old-style racism for leavening. Cat was hot tho, despite being left out in the rain.

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 21:17 (fourteen years ago)

did y'all know that this film was originally john frankenheimer and george axelrod's baby? then the studio hired audrey hepburn and she wanted frankenheimer off the project.

― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:22 (fourteen years ago)

i think f. maybe wanted kim stanley to star.

― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:23 (fourteen years ago)

kinda wish we'd all stop talking about the "racism"

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:35 (fourteen years ago)

The Mickey Rooney character is egregious!

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:42 (fourteen years ago)

Patricia Neal is kind of lovely in this, though.

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:43 (fourteen years ago)

misread that as Patrice O'Neal at first and lol

― a dense custard of infinity (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:44 (fourteen years ago)

I dunno. The film is fraught in more interesting ways than Mickey Rooney's textbook caricature..

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:47 (fourteen years ago)

Holly is definitely more louche in the novella - it kind of reminds me of whom Cole Porter wished to play him in a film bio ('Night and Day'); Cary Grant.

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:53 (fourteen years ago)

but Cary Grant COULD have played him a better film! I mean, Cary Grant is the distillation of every Cole Porter song character.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:54 (fourteen years ago)

It was a hit too

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:55 (fourteen years ago)

I like my demi-mondaines a little real and cruffy around the edges or I like them like Zola's Nana, entirely too OTT.

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 22:56 (fourteen years ago)

i reread the novella a couple years ago and was amazed how dislikeable holly was! which of course is the point -- in real life, ppl like holly are impossible to be friends with.

― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 23:53 (fourteen years ago)

the film kind of gets that across a little maybe?

― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Wednesday, 20 June 2012 13:22 (thirteen years ago)

It does if you look past Hepburn's natural charm. I like her so much better in 'Roman Holiday'.

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Wednesday, 20 June 2012 13:43 (thirteen years ago)

It just occurred to me that José Luis de Vilallonga is in both "Breakfast at Tiffany's' and 'Darling' - interesting comparing the two.

― Love Max Ophüls of us all (Michael White), Wednesday, 20 June 2012 13:46 (thirteen years ago)

Having been to Rome a few times over the past 2 years, we watched RHol recently.

The scene where they're driving crazy through town on scooters, I keep expecting them to crash into all the market barrows selling Audrey Hepburn souvenirs!

― Mark G, Wednesday, 20 June 2012 13:48 (thirteen years ago)

six months pass...

so there's a stage adap opening on Broadway in March; faithful to Capote, ie, set during WW2 and presumably FRED IS GAY.

http://www.playbill.com/news/article/173395-Broadways-Breakfast-at-Tiffanys-Goes-on-Sale-to-General-Public-Dec-24

gonna disappoint a lotta Audrey-lovin' tourists

― saltwater incursion (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 15 January 2013 20:48 (thirteen years ago)

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