By John LaBarbera

Almost a year after Philip Seymour Hoffman delivered an Oscar winning performance in Capote, Toby Jones takes on the eccentric author in a similarly engrossing film.

Truman Capote, a very high-class novelist, living a very high-class life in New York City, reads a disturbing story, about the quadruple homicide of a Kansas Family, in the morning paper. He gets the idea to write a psychological article for the New Yorker on the tragedy’s impact on the citizens of the rural town. So, he consults his high society gal pals, Babe Paley (Sigourney Weaver) and Slim Keith (Hope Davis) on his decision to head out West and inspect. They all tell him to go for it, and he asks his old friend, fellow novelist Nelle Harper Lee, played with Southern class by the always wonderful Sandra Bullock, to go with him. She does, and they head out.

Upon arriving in the one horse town of Holcomb, Kansas, Truman meets Alvin Dewey, portrayed by Jeff Daniels, the detective in charge of the Clutter Family Murder investigation. He is a little less than cooperative with Truman, which leads to his nickname, “Foxy.” At this point, the citizens of Holcomb are equally unresponsive to, and sometimes put off by, Truman’s outright questions about the gruesome homicide; but his fish out of water antics in this small burg makes for some hilarious sights.

They decide to stay the holidays and are spend Christmas with the Deweys, on an invitation from The Detective’s wife, Marie. There, Truman dazzles the other guests with tales of movie stars, which in turn, interests more people to invite Mr. Capote to their own homes. This finally makes the little town folks speak openly to the funny little man from New York.

It’s at this moment that Truman decides that this story would be better suited for a book than an article. One night, while at the Dewey residence, Alvin gets a phone call. The two murderers have been caught. Truman pulls some strings and gets to talk to these men face to face, in their jail cells. He gets a mouthful from talkative Dick Hickock, played by the excellent young actor, Lee Pace, who views the four killings as no big deal. At first, he gets absolutely nothing out of Dick’s partner, Perry Smith, played both stoically and emotionally beautiful by Daniel Craig, in his last Pre-Bond role.

This is where the film takes a dark turn. Truman becomes obsessed with Perry, and eventually sees him everyday and focuses on him far more than Dick. Perry tells Truman his whole life, and his secrets and desires. The movie now becomes a psychological drama.

I’ll spare you the rest of the twists and turns because I highly suggest you see this film. It is by far the best I have seen in a very long time. Douglas McGrath’s script and direction is beyond superb and Rachel Portman’s score is perfectly done. Every performance was dynamic and could not have done better. We will definitely be seeing the name Capote at the Oscars, once again. My suggestion? Daniel Craig for Best Supporting Actor.

There was not a moment where I felt disinterested. I laughed, I cried, I had a good time.

GRADE: A