Obsession

I spent the day reading and applying for job ads, and saving and listing them in various places because my Mom and my HR-minded sister say it's important to keep track of them to be able to recall details in case of a phone interview (which I hope to avoid, as I prefer face-to-face communication). To accompany my activities, in the morning I listened to Sarah Vaughan, then in the afternoon I switched to Nina Simone. I had an instant noodle soup, a hamburger, some tea, and some chocolates as well, resulting in finishing off my Christmas supply of sweets at last.

Truman Capote

At the moment the weather is grey and wet and I feel a bit down, and my eyes must be bloodshot, nevertheless I feel the need to write about my latest read as it's been hard for me to go to sleep on account of my thoughts running wild in relation to this book, In Cold Blood by Truman Capote.
It is a "true account" of a multiple murder case committed on November 15, 1959 in Holcomb, Kansas. It would be hard to label the book according to genre. It is somewhere between a mystery novel and a documentary. It doesn't follow the characteristics of a mystery novel in the sense that here not the who but the why is important. It is more like a psychological journey, from the last day of the victimized family to the execution of the killers.
This was my first experience with Capote, if we don't count seeing the film adaptation of Breakfast at Tiffany's, starring Audrey Hepburn, which is undoubtedly a classic and a must-see. Based on this book I am convinced that he was a genius. He collected a huge amount of testimonies, which he then arranged in a brilliant narrative, which combines the chronological order of events with flashbacks, flashforwards, and suspense. I haven't read about the exact details of his research, but the book implies a thorough knowledge of the background of the case as well as the main characters involved in it.
What struck me most is that there was practically no motive for the murders, and both criminals had above average intelligence level, but that didn't stop them from killing this family of good-hearted and obedient civilians, who had nothing to do with the killers. I believe that Capote was thinking along these lines when he set off for writing this book. As he also mentioned in relation to the inhabitants of Holcomb, the most terrifying realization they made as a result of this case is that since it happened to this family, it could happen to anyone. Towards the end of the book, when the murderers are serving there sentence on the Death Row, several infamous killers of the time appear in the book, and one of them actually killed his own family, which is about the most sinister crime I can imagine. Yet it is becoming a more and more frequent element of the daily news, even here in Hungary. In fact, a couple of weeks ago the family of one of the kids at my boyfriend's school was attacked by the former boyfriend of the mother, and this boy of 9 actually saw his grandfather being killed. Where is it all leading, and isn't there a way to stop this?

Yesterday we watched a movie with a similar topic, To Die For, from 1995, starring Nicole Kidman, Matt Dillon, and young Joaquin Phoenix. It was labelled a black comedy, but it's more like a thriller, if you ask me. I have this impression that very often the person who writes the captions on the cover of a DVD hasn't actually seen the film. This film was based on a book, but it could have been true considering all the news of similar nature that I have heard of. The protagonist is Suzanne "Gangbuster" Maretto (neé Stone), a country girl with a college education, who is over-ambitious about becoming a news person. She wears suits in bright green, pink, yellow, and all the colors of the rainbow, provided that it has a tight-fitting mini skirt, accompanied by high heels of course. She sends out CVs by the thousand until one day she gets the weather forecast at a local studio. In her free time she ventures in lots of self-assigned projects, including shooting "sociologically oriented" videos with three high school kids, who turn out to be the future murderers of her husband, the ever-so-loving Larry (Matt Dillon). The director of the film is the world-famous Gus Van Sant, best known for Good Will Hunting. Kidman received a Golden Globe and was nominated for Oscar for her portrayal of Suzanne, and Joaquin Phoenix, playing the somewhat aberrant high school kid lover of Suzanne, is also terrific in it. Not to mention his looks (which remind me of a boy I was in love with about ten years ago).