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Created Sep 15, 2013 12:12AM PST • Edited Nov 07, 2015 10:03AM PST

1. Quality

2. Summary

   Great 4.0

   Breakfast at Tiffany’s is the apotheosis of Kennedy-era Mad Men America. Was it ever on the show? Don’t recall. Coulda, shoulda.

   Blake Edwards opens his movie of Truman Capote’s novella on an empty Fifth Avenue, with Audrey Hepburn in a little black dress emerging at the only Tiffany’s in the world – closed, quiet as a tomb.

   Moon River – faux sophistication incarnate – plays as she approaches her Temple of Luxor destination. Henry Mancini’s orchestra quickly gives way to her star power. Holly Golightly has arrived.

   Superstar turns get no more accomplished than Audrey in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. She wakes? Makeup perfect, eyelashes and everything. Returning home, she spends five minutes in front of a mirror, emerging gorgeous. Then there’s her iconic Givenchy number, the one that became The Little Black Dress.

   Capote’s fictional story glorifies the rich milieu he moved in for real, populated by models, agents, millionaires, photographers and hangers-on.

   One senses he saw himself equally in Holly Golightly and her beau, thus covering all bases from a sexuality POV. The writer being a good looking guy, natch. Speaking of authorial identification, both Holly and her writer depended on the kindness of older lovers. Think Capote wrote what he knew?

   Great Scenes Abound

   • A gamin Audrey looks up at a buxom stripper, tossing bon mots about her “money.” Stripper’s name? Miss Beverly Hills. Mr. Truman Capote sure could write, and not just names. For instance, he has Audrey inquire if Miss Hills is “deeply and importantly talented?” No mere typing, that.
   • Audrey sits in a window, strumming and singing Moon River – classic and lovely beyond words. It won the Oscar for Best Song in ’61.
   • The party is legendary – Holly Golightly’s party, complete with a transvestite hottie. You half expect to see Don Draper there. Music? Jazz, just pre-rock. Audrey iconically rocked the world’s longest cigarette holder, pictured so well in the Italian poster above.

   Not all is wine and roses however. Old Mickey Rooney delivers one of the worst smears in Hollywood history as Holly Golightly’s upstairs neighbor, a Japanese photographer. Wearing an appliance to distort his mouth, he caricatures Asian stereotypes in a lame attempt at comedy. Half a century later, some people still have unresolved issues with it. And yet…

   Breakfast at Tiffany’s continues to delight, deeply and importantly talented to this day.

   ---

   This review written with Moon River on repeat: first Henry Mancini & his Orchestra, then Audrey Hepburn. Think of it as The Little Mellow Playlist.

4. Acting

   Great 4.0

   Audrey Hepburn and Holly Golightly go together like glamour and Givenchy. The woman embodied both in an iconic turn at the beginning of the superstar era. If aliens ever invade Earth, they’ll look at Holly by Audrey to see what mid-20th century Americans idealized.

   George Peppard looks like Armie Hammer. His hair is perfect. Peppard went on to become a major TV star. TV, not movies, which is why his performance supports Audrey’s while not nearly approaching it. He is a plausible gigolo, though that description would offend his character.

   Supporters

   • Mickey Rooney’s Mr. Yunioshi lives in infamy, a grotesquely caricatured Asian. Too much typing has already been spent on him, so I’ll not add to it here.
   • Patricia Neal’s rich married Manhattan woman keeps a pet Peppard.
   • Buddy Ebsen made his star playing Doc Golightly, Holly’s secret husband. Oops, spoiler. Ebsen went on to TV immortality in Green Acres.
   • Martin Balsam is terrific as a big time talent agent.

   At the cost of leaving several prominent names out, let’s now recognize

   Beverly Powers as Miss Beverly Hills, Nightclub Stripper

5. Male Stars Very Good 3.5

6. Female Stars Perfect 5.0

7. Female Costars Great 4.0

8. Male Costars Great 4.0

10. Film

    Great 4.0

    The writer is a charming and naturally hetero hero. Capote cleaned up well for mainstream America. While we’re on the Little Genius, let’s also observe that the story reaches into the bizarre South. Typical Capote. You can take the writer out of Dixie, but can’t take Dixie out of the writer.

    His story crackles with great writing. To wit, the weather report: snow flurries this weekend in New Orleans. Pre-Elmore Leonard, that’s pretty good.

    Errata

    • One of the great NY movies. NYC before muggings. Upper East Side lustfully. Uptown, a mere seven years after Rear Window.
    • Same period as Fellini. Kinda sorta La Dolce Vita: New York.
    • Crackerjack prize is a wedding ring. Only in America.
    • Holly Golightly was promising in 1956. The story’s set in ‘61, five years later. Now she’s glommed onto a rich mafioso con.

11. Direction Great 4.0

12. Play Great 4.0

    Little more than a short story, barely sustains a full movie. Still, lots of great lines:

    • “And I always heard that people in NY don’t get to know their neighbors.”
    • “Typical North American home”

13. Music Really Great 4.5

    Moon River full of faux sophistication. “There’s such a lot of world to see.” Please.

    Still deserves it’s Oscar winning status.

14. Visuals Great 4.0

    Costume Credits Extraordinaire

    • Hubert de Givenchy – principal wardrobe: Miss Hepburn
    • Edith Head – costume supervisor
    • Pauline Trigere – principal wardrobe: Miss Neal

    Errata

    • NY hip – Bathtub Love Seat, in a visual postcard to Mid-Century Manhattan
    • Audrey had highlights in her hair, exotic in ’61.
15. Content

16. Edge

    Tame 1.5

    Wickedly tame.

17. Sex Titillating 1.8

18. Violence Gentle 1.3

19. Rudeness Polite 1.5

21. Reality

    Glib 1.5

    An aspiring writer wore Navy blazer and grey slacks. Never see that again. Here’s another thing you’ll never see again, a respectable man littering after not ordering a frankfurter.

    The only Tiffany & Co. in 1961?

    In 1940 the company moved to its present Fifth Avenue location, and in 1955 the Tiffany heirs sold their shares to Hoving Corporation. Walter Hoving, chairman and CEO, expanded Tiffany & Co. beyond its New York City store to San Francisco in 1963 and added locations in Beverly Hills and Houston in 1964. Tiffany & Company: A Case Study by Stephanie Blackburn

    Do you think it helped having an iconic movie feature your brand just before opening your second store? Answer that wrong and you don’t deserve to shop at Tiffany’s.

22. Circumstantial Glib 2.0

23. Biological Glib 1.5

24. Physical Natural 1.0