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

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

Not all messages are displayed: show all messages (131 of them)

Is the book good? I'd imagine the sentimentality was turned up several degrees for the film and without that the story might succeed. I think it's mentioned that Holly or "Lula" was 14 when she got married - that implies that she might have been running away from a genuinely awful situation and not just some kindly old dolt who she doesn't love.

― Hurting 2, Saturday, 17 March 2007 04:24 (seventeen years ago) link

i've always wished hitchcock had made this movie

― rrrobyn, Saturday, 17 March 2007 04:29 (seventeen years ago) link

even though i do like things about it, such as the party scenes, and the cat

― rrrobyn, Saturday, 17 March 2007 04:30 (seventeen years ago) link

Her obsession her brother was a bit bizarre.

― Hurting 2, Saturday, 17 March 2007 04:34 (seventeen years ago) link

Okay yeah, I'm definitely having lens-of-the-book issues, because I chafe at the idea that her origins are a subplot ("but it's who she is do you see?") or that her brother-love is weird. The book is just ... perfect in its arrangement, gorgeous in its sentences, and highly recommended, especially since it'll only cost you a few hours.

Mr. Yunioishi comes off kinda bad-ass and decadent in the book, by the way.

― nabisco, Saturday, 17 March 2007 06:01 (seventeen years ago) link

I got from the movie that that was supposed to be *who she is*, but only in a very explained and not felt sort of way, hence the whole thing felt like a subplot.

― Hurting 2, Saturday, 17 March 2007 06:06 (seventeen years ago) link

Yeah, definitely. I think that's a function of the biggest problem with this adaptation, and the casting of Hepburn in it -- she's a little too convincingly elegant, almost innocent. Book-Holly is blonder, harsher, and dirtier: there's an actual impact to those powder-room men, she's more transparently phony, and she's constantly making obnoxiously "shocking" comments and calling people dykes. There's still the lopsided romantic side that Hepburn embodies, but when you learn about her history it connects with her character much more strongly. (And Doc Golightly's still sweet, and Holly's still generally nice to him, but there's much more of an undertow of her not really giving a shit about anyone at all.)

― nabisco, Saturday, 17 March 2007 06:31 (seventeen years ago) link

fucking wet Cat

― Dr Morbius, Saturday, 17 March 2007 16:17 (seventeen years ago) link

But without this movie, we would never have had the hit song by Deep Blue Something.

― Ben Boyerrr, Saturday, 17 March 2007 18:39 (seventeen years ago) link

"It's really not very good."

this is true. worth seeing though.

― scott seward, Saturday, 17 March 2007 18:45 (seventeen years ago) link

i bet this movie has been the sole impetus for more than one young idealistic person's move to nyc

― rrrobyn, Saturday, 17 March 2007 18:49 (seventeen years ago) link

so, yes, it is worth seeing!

― rrrobyn, Saturday, 17 March 2007 18:50 (seventeen years ago) link

at least as a phenomenon

― rrrobyn, Saturday, 17 March 2007 18:57 (seventeen years ago) link

without this movie we would never have had it's awesome soundtrack.

― Lingbert, Saturday, 17 March 2007 19:16 (seventeen years ago) link

I love Audrey, but has she ever done a truly classic movie? I've not seen "Charade"

― Daniel_Rf, Saturday, 17 March 2007 19:27 (seventeen years ago) link

"Roman Holiday" is wonderful. "Wait Until Dark" is terrific too.

― musically, Saturday, 17 March 2007 21:12 (seventeen years ago) link

"Sabrina" and "My Fair Lady" are both awesome. I dig "Breakfast at Tiffanys" loads too, fuck the haterz.

― Pashmina, Saturday, 17 March 2007 21:47 (seventeen years ago) link

Her best perf is in The Nun's Story

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Saturday, 17 March 2007 22:05 (seventeen years ago) link

I love Charade, but it's classic because of Cary Grant. Hepburn does have that great "you know what's wrong with you? nothing" line, but that line works because she's talking to Cary Grant. and it's definitely a style movie more than a substance one. I said this in the "overrated" thread, but I totally don't get her, with the exception of her performance in Roman Holiday. which is kind of a slight, but I guess classic. the movie, I mean. how come nobody ever gives Gregory Peck any credit for having been uber-hot back then?

I've shamefully never read Breakfast at Tiffany's, and I fear the movie has ruined it for me. because the movie is dumb.

― horseshoe, Saturday, 17 March 2007 22:20 (seventeen years ago) link

I got from the movie that that was supposed to be *who she is*, but only in a very explained and not felt sort of way, hence the whole thing felt like a subplot.

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.

I watched the very boring Terry Gilliam film Tideland last night, which has just been made more interesting by the possibility that the little girl in it could have grown up to be like Holly Golightly.

― accentmonkey, Sunday, 18 March 2007 09:05 (seventeen years ago) link

Audrey Hepburn is ridiculously beautiful in this. It isn't very good, otherwise.

― Gukbe, Sunday, 18 March 2007 13:04 (seventeen years ago) link

this movie is great you suckas

― J.D., Monday, 19 March 2007 07:42 (seventeen years ago) link

Hating on Breakfast At Tiffany's means romance has died within your soul.

― Anna, Monday, 19 March 2007 11:20 (seventeen years ago) link

The book is basically a completely damn different story (well, aside from Buddy Ebsen's character, and that works brilliantly), so go ahead and read Capote please.

On balance it's a reasonably film -- Blake Edwards sort of began to establish his comedic style here (or Operation Petticoat, maybe? never saw it), which was wildly uneven but had high peaks -- it's just not convincing, even on its own terms; the Peppard character just isn't engaging.

― Dr Morbius, Monday, 19 March 2007 17:57 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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

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

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

Yeah, that too!

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

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 (seventeen years ago) link

Actually I think it was me that zinged him.

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

But s1ocki said "zing."

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

Actually slocki made the same point on this thread.

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

"MISTA RAUTERBACH!"

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

A friend of mine swears by Robin and Marian.

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

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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

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

No, but I thought about it!

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

I can't imagine Alan Arkin NOT looking glum.

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

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

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

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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 (seventeen years ago) link

[Removed Illegal Link]

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

I Must Protest

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

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 (seventeen years ago) link

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

Some other versions I've heard are cool

― FP Sorrow (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 22 April 2012 23:40 (twelve years ago) link

"Moon River" is easily the best thing abt the BTF film

― World Congress of Itch (Dr Morbius), Monday, 23 April 2012 02:29 (twelve years ago) link

youtube clip of Nelson from the Simpsons, teary-eyed, watching Andy Williams' do an encore of Moon River in Branson, MO while en route to Tennessee with Bart and Milhouse in a rental car to thread!

― Aimless, Monday, 23 April 2012 02:40 (twelve years ago) link

one month passes...

Richard Brody vs Glenn Kenny on the casting of Hepburn.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:44 (eleven years ago) link

Interesting comment in there by, surprise, David E:

Carol Matthau (a woman who REALLY knew where all the bodies were buried) said Holly was a mash-up betwen her and truman himself. She was right.

― Pangborn to be Wilde (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:51 (eleven years ago) link

i love that line from (i think) wilson's onegin review, but it's how i feel about literally all of my friends. doesn't everyone?

― a hauntingly unemployed american (difficult listening hour), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:55 (eleven years ago) link

Nabokov is always called the "winner" in their spat – why, because he was a better "stylist" and dickhead than Bunny?

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:56 (eleven years ago) link

well at least he spoke russian.

― a hauntingly unemployed american (difficult listening hour), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:57 (eleven years ago) link

is there a word for "courtesy" in Russian

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:58 (eleven years ago) link

Never really did get into this movie much. Even the cat edit is sort of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

― old people are made of poop (Eric H.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:59 (eleven years ago) link

"poshlust" xp

― a hauntingly unemployed american (difficult listening hour), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:59 (eleven years ago) link

i hated this movie when i saw it but i was like 15.

― a hauntingly unemployed american (difficult listening hour), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 14:59 (eleven years ago) link

Kenny's right inasmuch as Hepburn makes the transformation from po' white trash to Manhattan socialite credible but I've a problem generally with how Hepburn looks encouraged by Edwards to act more sophisticated and daaahling than she is. It's a cloying performance.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:03 (eleven years ago) link

Don't think Hepburn ever needed any extra coaxing to act sophisticated and daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahling.

― old people are made of poop (Eric H.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:05 (eleven years ago) link

(That's what undoes her otherwise good Wait Until Dark performance.)

― old people are made of poop (Eric H.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:05 (eleven years ago) link

Holly is 19 in the book, which is why Capote said circa 1980 that Jodie Foster would be great.

― Pangborn to be Wilde (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:05 (eleven years ago) link

What mostly undoes her WUD work is how she's encouraged to act stupider than she is.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:06 (eleven years ago) link

And blinder.

― old people are made of poop (Eric H.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:09 (eleven years ago) link

why couldn't Efrem Zimbalist Jr. have a fridge fall on him

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:11 (eleven years ago) link

Still, better Henri Mancini music than B@T's.

― old people are made of poop (Eric H.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:18 (eleven years ago) link

On a very highbrow note, the Seinfeld episode where George cheats on his book club was on yesterday. "So--are we still talking, or are we watching the movie?"

― clemenza, Tuesday, 19 June 2012 15:20 (eleven years ago) link

i am reminded of robert crumb's angry letter to ivan brunetti in schizo: 'i HATE audrey hepburn and all her ilk!!!'

― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 19:08 (eleven years ago) link

I think it's mentioned that Holly or "Lula" was 14 when she got married - that implies that she might have been running away from a genuinely awful situation and not just some kindly old dolt who she doesn't love.
― Hurting 2, Saturday, March 17, 2007 12:24 AM (5 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

In the book, Doc says that Holly and her brother were orphaned and fending for themselves when he took them in, and Holly claims her sexual history before she married Doc (at age 14) "doesn't count," so yes, Holly was coming from a very rough background.

Officially I don't believe in the concept of the "guilty pleasure." But the BoT film is such a glossy-gorgeous shell around such a grotty story, that I hate to see it held up as a fashion or lifestyle icon.

― i like slash and i vote (j.lu), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 21:03 (eleven years ago) link

nah -- I wish more women used cigarette holders and named their cats Cat.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 21:08 (eleven years ago) link

Don't forget about her earplug/rings!

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

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

i think f. maybe wanted kim stanley to star.

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

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 (eleven years ago) link

The Mickey Rooney character is egregious!

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

Patricia Neal is kind of lovely in this, though.

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

misread that as Patrice O'Neal at first and lol

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

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

It was a hit too

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

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

the film kind of gets that across a little maybe?

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

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

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 (eleven years ago) link

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.