Just saw Breakfast at Tiffany's for the first time

A few observations:

It's fun seeing New York City when it was really nice. Especially after watching The Deuce and recalling what it had become 10 years later.

I don't see the love for the Audrey Hepburn character. She's pretty, if you like that type. But Holly is an amoral gold-digger and I just don't get her appeal.

Overall, a few humorous moments but unlike another classic which I saw decades later, Casablanca, I don't see this being so great. Not going to get into the Mickey Rooney character because I saw how a previous thread got turned into a ....

 

My first time seeing it I couldn't help noticing that the George Peppard character looks really similar to Joe Buck, the sport announcer.

And for all the uproar about the Mickey Rooney character being offense, he was barely in the film! I thought he was a major character but that was not the case.

 

The first couple of times I saw it, I loved it. Now, I see all the criticism.

I realized that the part of it I enjoyed most was depicting young single people living in a big city, which resonated with my memories of living in DC in the 1980s.

Regarding Hepburn's character: I don't think she's supposed to be "appealing", either in the novelette or the movie. She's supposed to represent a lost soul, doing whatever she can to get by. We can empathize with her at that level.

 

Great early sixties classic,I have it in my film collection and watched it the other day..[A little fact-the title song-Moon River was first recorded by-Jerry Butler to be used in the film,but they chose not to.].

 

It's surprising that nobody's done a remake of this that's more true to the novella. That would provide a Rooney-free Yunioshi, an abused-child-of-the-Depression Holly (the novella's set in the '40s), a gay "Paul" and restoration of the Central Park horse ride.

It would also restore Capote's prophetic exchange between the protagonists: Holly reads one of the narrator's short stories and complains that it has too much description and "doesn't mean anything." The narrator asks Holly for an example of a story that she thinks does mean something.

Holly says, "'Wuthering Heights'. I saw it ten times."

"Oh, the movie" is the narrator's reply.

 

Mickey Rooney wasn't in the film for long time-wise, but every appearance is memorably offensive, IMHO.

 

Not memorable at all, IMO except for Audrey's rendition of Moon River.
Roman Holiday is much better

 

Agreed. The novella is a completely different animal. I've often wondered how a more faithful film would incorporate the narrator, since he's mostly an observer of the action rather than a participant.

I've often advised people that the only reason to watch Breakfast at Tiffany's is for the opening credits, featuring the luminous Mancini music and early 60s New York at sunrise, and the scene with Audrey Hepburn singing "Moon River." The rest is sentimental junk.

 

Oddly, all these years later, the best thing about the film is the Mancini soundtrack album.
Not only is it one of his best albums, but his usual use of the best West coast jazz musicians
make it essential for any Mancini collector. To this day (and I've been collecting Mancini
for 50 years) this album is still a jewel......
(The actual title is "Something For Cat")

 

Agree about the novella being a completely different (certainly more realistic) experience than the film, and count me in for wanting to see a remake. I think Todd Haynes would be perfect to direct it, as his attention to period detail and sensibilities would work really well.
I always thought the party scene was beautifully done.

 

I've never seen the film but love the Barney Kessell version of the soundtrack

 

Congratulations. You're one-up on me.

 

I kind of liked it

 

The party scene is my favorite part of the movie.

 

The opening scene was supposedly done in one take as traffic on Fifth Avenue miraculously disappeared just long enough to film. Of more concern was Audrey's hatred of Danishes! By comparison the party scene took two weeks to shoot.

 

Anyone interested in digging a bit deeper into this film and its times is advised to read this, very entertaining and informative.

 

How is Mickey's performance "memorably offensive" if the portrayal was intended to be comedy? I'm not sure what % of comedy, stand-up or otherwise, involves material that could be construed as offensive to someone, but it's a lot!

 

It's racist and far too heavy handed. And not funny.

 

You may not find the performance humorous or otherwise enjoyable, but it is wrong to apply to today's societal norms to those of 50+ years ago. Crying "racist" or "fascist" or "Nazi" is a real problem today. Good grief, screenings of this film have had to be canceled due to complaints. Crazy. I sure hope it's still ok to enjoy Blazing Saddles.

 

Delightful movie IMO. Great characters - Doc Golightly, Rusty Trawler, the cat.

Feel sorry for this generation of the pure-minded virtue signalers.

 

I enjoyed the movie too, despite many outdated values.

 

Well that's the one thing you've got.

dan c

 

"Mickey Rooney's bucktoothed, myopic Japanese is broadly exotic." - New York Times review, October 6, 1961

 

Even when it was released, the comments regarding Mickey Rooney's character would have been split between the people who refused to forgive Japanese involvement against the Allies in World War 2 and thought that the portrayal of his character as nearly blind, clumsy, buck-toothed and annoying was "accurate" and people who thought its heavy handed nature put a blemish in the film. In my opinion, that part of the film really dates it unacceptably, and I kinda wished it had been edited out. Just my opinion

 

I don't know how anyone thought including that performance was a good idea in 1961. In a broad comedy, maybe, but Breakfast at Tiffany's is not a broad comedy. Rooney sticks out like a boil on the prom queen's nose, and is just as welcome.