In Cold Blood (Richard Brooks, 1967)
Nice, low-key rendition of Capote's "novel of fact", mixing a quasi-documentary feel with noirish lighting and angles. I liked the recurring motif of the headlights of the cars journeying through the night on those long, straight roads. Although the seeming endless flatness of the landscape is not as obsessively portrayed as in
Capote, the lines are still there, on the road, in the Clutter house (whose interior comes off as stark and minimalist), the interrogation rooms, and jail.
The dynamic between Dick (Scott Wilson) and Perry (Robert Blake) is fantastic. The amoral charm of Dick - often calling Perry "Honey" - contrasting with the nervous, tightly-wound remorse of Perry, gives those long sojourns on the road some sort of rhythm. Don't know about the psychologising of Perry that goes on: his mum, his dad, that sort of thing. I think that starts to make the crime particular and peculiar to them, which is not what I thought the book was ultimately about, with Capote obsessing over the apparent ordinary meaninglessness of the crime via the accumulation of detail. It grated, and took something away from their situation.
Still, the state-sanctioned killings come off as just as meaningless. The delusions of the state mirror the delusions of Dick and Perry. Six murders, in the end. All in cold blood.