MovieChat Forums > In Cold Blood (1967) Discussion > So why kill..!

So why kill..!

posted 8 years ago by Anorensic
8 replies | jump to latest

Once it was clear that there was no money in the house, what was the point of going ahead with the killing! If they had left, wouldn't they have just been charged with breaking and entering and other small charges. Hardly any reason to finish off the witnesses for that!
They could have even threatened the family to keep it quiet before running away. They really hadn't done much to them up till that point other than terrorizing and tying up the family.

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[–] landrynumbertwo 8 years ago

Unfortunately, not all criminals are smart and rational beings.

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[–] movies789 8 years ago

Adding to landrynumbertwo's comment, the killers were stone-cold evil, so logic and rationality go out the window. And, along that line, I strongly take issue with the reporter Jensen's contention at the executions that the murders had been "crazy acts". Nonsense; they weren't crazy, they were evil. Accepting the "crazy" narrative would require an insanity acquittal. Well, not in my world; hanging was too gentle a departure for these vermin.

[–] Moviemadness2012 8 years ago

Once it was clear that there was no money in the house, what was the point of going ahead with the killing! If they had left, wouldn't they have just been charged with breaking and entering and other small charges. Hardly any reason to finish off the witnesses for that!
They could have even threatened the family to keep it quiet before running away. They really hadn't done much to them up till that point other than terrorizing and tying up the family.

Capote's novel said that they precisely didn't want to serve time (up to 10 years) for breaking and entering, etc., so they killed the family (thinking they wouldn't be caught).

In the film, the real reason for the killings is shown more dramatically: Perry has a flashback of his abusive father, so he kills the "father" (Mr. Clutter); and as his rage gets out of control, he kills the others.

[–] haynese_98 7 years ago

We're talking about two career criminals(probably sociopaths) who feed off each other. Their crimes escalated until the inevitable happened.

Note that desperate people do desperate things. Add 2 criminal sociopaths to that mix and you get muurrddeeerrrr.

Shall we play a game?

[–] rsgre 7 years ago

Thanks for your comments everyone, just saw this again after many years, looks better than ever. Scarier than ever too, two career criminals that go on a horrible crime spree and a poor innocent family pays the ultimate price. Two criminal sociopaths is right. Reminds me of "Psycho".

RSGRE

[–] PrometheusTree64 7 years ago

The Clutter father gave Perry a sad, disappointed look. That set Perry off.

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[–] redban (5145) 3 years ago

Yeah, if they didn't kill the family, then they would've been charged with breaking and entering / burglary. But with a prior record (as well as parolee statuses), those charges would still give them years of hard time. They wanted to get off scot-free. They killed the family to eliminate witnesses.

[–] liscarkat (16434) 3 months ago

Because they were dangerous psychopaths. The only good thing about the entire thing is that in the end they both got what they deserved.