Saturday 3 February 2018 / books, film
Breakfast at Tiffany's is a shit movie - admit it
This year, I decided to have my first New Year’s Eve night in in, well, ever. With a house to myself and otherwise faced with somewhat shit options, I decided to relax. A bubble bath, girly magazines, white wine, a bit of antipasti, maybe a face mask or two, and a Sex and the City binge. A proper basic bitch girly evening, finished off with one of those posh fruit tarts from Sainsbury’s patisserie and a viewing of the ultimate girl movie: Breakfast at Tiffany’s.
I’d never seen it before. I know. I think I’d been put off by the oversaturation of the Holly Golightly legend; the dorm room posters, the pearls-and-cigarette-holder Halloween costumes, that horrendous nineties song. But it seemed my time had come – it is a damn stylish movie, after all: those trench coats, and that wide-brimmed hat! And don’t tell anyone, but Moon River (the Andy Williams version) is one of my all-time favourite songs, and the book by Truman Capote is one of the greatest novellas of the 20th century. Capote is unfuckupable, right? Well, actually, no. There’s certainly a charm and romance to the film, but it’s aged very badly. Much eye-rolling ensued.
So without further ado, here is why your favourite movie sucks and why all copies of the DVD should be burnt immediately.
The painfully racist portrayal of Mr Yunioshi
You knew this one was coming. White actor Mickey Rooney’s role as Holly’s Japanese landlord is widely considered offensive, spawning protests at screenings and even getting the film labelled the second most racist of all time by Complex, behind only Birth of a Nation. The character would have been offensive even if played by an actual Japanese man – he’s a shallow stereotype, perpetually angry and unintelligible.
He serves no real purpose to the plot and is there purely for the audience to laugh at. The worst part is, his character is barely even in the novella; it’s Madam Spanella who is constantly furious with Holly. The filmmakers actually went out of their way to add this incredibly offensive character into the film.
Holly Golightly is an animal abuser
Why does no one ever talk about this? Admittedly, she’s not much kinder to her cat in the book, but the movie takes it further. She literally throws the poor thing across the room for no reason at one point, and then later cruelly dumps it on the streets of New York. In the book, the nameless cat finds a new (and presumably much more loving) home at the end, but unfortunately for Movie Kitty, she manages to track him down. In the book, the narrator rightly calls her a bitch for this, but in the movie he tells her he loves her and they finally share a passionate kiss. What is this? Not that Paul’s much of a prize himself… I guess they deserve each other.
Paul/Fred is a dick
This is another point I’m surprised isn’t talked about more. Movie Paul is an absolute shit; a misogynistic, entitled shit. More than once, he tells Holly he owns her because he loves her and refuses to listen to her when she tells him she doesn’t feel the same, becoming enraged. So gross. Not only that, but he’s incredibly judgmental about her lifestyle, despite the fact that he too is implied to be a sex worker! Even more explicitly than she is, in fact!
Another infuriating thing about the movie is that later in the same scene, she decides she does in fact love him back and he gets the girl – he’s literally rewarded for his chauvinism and Holly’s own autonomy is eroded into nothing. I think that’s the most frustrating thing about the film; the whole point of the story is that Holly’s this wild bird who can’t be caged – untameable – yet the movie ending destroys all of this. In the end, she’s domesticated by Paul. By shunning her own free-spirited nature, she gets the man! Yay! This might work if portrayed as tragic or bittersweet, but it’s supposed to be romantic. A happy ending! In contrast, Book Holly flees to Brazil, never reunites with the cat and is never romantically involved with the narrator, who is suggested to be gay.
It's just boring
Look, the film was made in 1961. I get that times have changed. But Book Holly has so much more spice! She gets knocked up by her best friend’s man. She’s a prostitute! She travels the world, leaving behind only rumours in New York City. She won't let any man tame her. So much of the novella was sanitised for screen, including suggestion of childhood sexual abuse and her unexpected advocation for gay marriage (in a book written in the Fifties!). At the end of the day, to me at least, the movie just comes off as a bit of a generic film masquerading as a classic.
I'm not normally one for remakes, but I'd love to see a modern adaptation - provided it's a new interpretation of the novella and not a remake of the original film. The film is too iconic, it's imagery too entrenched in contemporary pop culture that a new Breakfast at Tiffany's starring a gamine MPDG in an LBD would be too cringeworthy for words, but the book itself has a lot of cinema potential. Take it back to the original 1940s setting, bring back the darker aspects of the written story, and remove the unnecessary romance in favour of the much more interesting relationship the characters share in the book. One can dream!
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