What does bother me is the self-conscious “art” that Brooks allows into his film. It does not mix with the actual events. The music on the sound track, for example, is almost conventional Hollywood spook music, as if these murders had to be made convincing. The sounds of the landscape—the wind and weather—would have been music enough. Again some of the photography is staged and distracting. We see Herb Clutter shaving, and fade to one of the killers shaving. We see Perry’s bus transform itself into a Santa Fe train passing through Holcomb. Gimmicks like this belong in TV commercials.
