Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a famous American film, which was praised as the “Best American comedy in the 1960s” by the film critics. It is adapted from the novel of the same name published by Capote in 1950. The novel shows the anxiety and anxiety of people during the World War II. It also satirizes those who are close to the upper-class society by unscrupulous means, and reflects on the system and dark side of society. But the director, Blake Edwards, interprets the story of a 19-year-old girl flirting with a rich man and looking for true love as a gentle love story, and gives it an ending that combines tragedy and comedy. Facts have proved that this interpretation is extremely successful. “Breakfast of Tiffany” has won three important awards, including Oscar, and has been nominated six times. Audrey Hepburn has been nominated for the best actress at the Oscar for the fourth time.
The beginning of the story
In the early morning, there was no one in the sky on New York’s Fifth Avenue, wearing a black evening dress with a fake jewelry necklace hanging on her neck. Holly Golettly, dressed up in style, stood alone in front of the Tiffany’s jewelry store, with her cheek close to the window, holding a kraft paper bag in her hand, eating praiseworthy bread in the bag, drinking hot coffee, and watching everything in the Tiffany’s store with envious eyes
At the beginning of the film, we are presented with such a picture.
After that, male characters related to Holly quickly appeared. Eisid, who was lying in the car waiting for Holly to come back, and the Japanese landlord upstairs, shouted for Holly to give him a statement, and one complained that Holly lost the key every once in a while and rang his doorbell.
Holly quickly solved these problems, and she sent Eisid away with all kinds of affection and won the forgiveness of the landlord. It was getting brighter. Holly, who had not slept all night, finally returned to her room and fell asleep.
The hero Paul appeared that morning. He rang Holly’s doorbell and wanted to borrow her phone. Holly is not defensive against him. This is obviously an innocent and confused girl. Paul saw the phone she hid in the trunk to reduce the ring, the cat with no name, the crocodile leather shoes left in the flower basket, and she went to Xinxin Prison to visit an old man every Thursday to get a fee of $100.
Holly knew that Paul was a writer and had published a book a long time ago, but also happened to find that he could only rely on the supply of a rich wife. In fact, they are the same. They all rely on other people’s help. The difference is that Paul still has dreams in his heart.
Holly with “affectation”
Holly invited Paul to her party. Paul saw a room of well-dressed socialites at the party. They smoked cigarettes, held champagne, and talked and laughed. Some viewers described it as “a very gorgeous and ironic goldfish pond with a mixed fish eye that belongs to Holly and is full of noise in a small urban social arena”, which was absolutely point-blank.
Holly found the best prey in her “goldfish pond”, trust, one of the richest men under the age of 50 in the United States. She told Paul that she would become Mrs. Trust. Holly and Trust soon left the party together.
The next day, Paul, who was writing at home, heard a faint song. Open the window, but Holly plays and sings with her guitar. This is Holly on the other side. She doesn’t wear exaggerated earrings or gorgeous dresses, but simply sings:
The Moon River is no more than a mile wide. I will meet you gracefully one day. Oh! Dreamweaver, the sad man. No matter where you will go, I will follow you.
Holly is such a naive and lustful person. Holly’s agent once said to Paul, “She is a pretentious person who believes in those lies.” The agent spent a year making Holly learn French and turn her from a country girl into an elegant and beautiful social flower, but Holly ran to New York before the audition because she had never been to New York.
Such affectation is probably the complex state shown by Holly, who is still naive in the deep heart but has both sides on the surface. In order to pursue money and prosperity, she can only confine her real self in a cage, dare not pursue the world outside the cage, and dare not pursue and create the future together with lovers. Perhaps it is this contradiction and complexity that attracts men to rush for Holly, and makes the audience unable to scold her even though they know her material side.
Broken dreams
The news that the trust married the fourth wife was published in the newspaper, but the American man in the picture was obviously not the one in the previous party. Paul knocked on Holly’s door. Holly told him that she had known the news. “The man is not rich, but his family is rich.” She said so. They decided to start a romantic date and do something they had never done before.
They drank champagne in the morning, walked in the streets of New York hand in hand, bought the only silver telephone dialer worth less than ten dollars in Tiffany’s shop, and asked Tiffany to engrave their ring. It was a cheap ring sent in a chocolate bag. They hoped to engrave their initials.
They also went to the bargain shop on the street to steal things. They put on masks and walked out of the bargain shop door hand in hand. As soon as they went out, they ran back to the apartment.
Paul felt that he had fallen in love with Holly. Falling in love, he decided to have a showdown with his rich wife. He didn’t want to be a midnight cowherd. He showed his love to Holly, but Holly suddenly announced that the Brazilian millionaire was after her.
Before long, they had breakfast together. Holly, who had never cooked before, listened to Portuguese and casually drizzled olive oil and red vinegar in the salad bowl. Paul proposed to her, but Holly said that she would marry a rich Brazilian. The pressure cooker stewed with chicken salad made a splash. When Holly tried to turn off the fire, she heard only an explosion, and the chicken and soup splashed everywhere. This failed chicken salad seems to predict Holly’s dream of building a Brazilian farm and becoming a rich Brazilian housewife will eventually disappear like a foam.
Before long, the police arrested Holly in the name of assisting in drug trafficking. The old man she visits every Thursday turned out to be a big drug lord. The matter became so boisterous that the Brazilian rich gave up their commitment to Holly.
Holly and Paul left the police station on a rainy day and took a taxi. Holly was supposed to fly to Brazil that day, and she cried bitterly. Paul showed his love again, but Holly stubbornly wanted to go to Brazil, and still refused to give up her dream of wealth.
Paul said before getting off the bus: Miss Anonymous, do you know what’s wrong with you? You are afraid of things, you have no guts, you are afraid to hold your chest up and say: life is like this. People love each other and belong to each other, because this is the only chance to get real happiness. You call yourself wild and unruly, but you are afraid that others will lock you in a cage. You are already in the cage, and you built it yourself. It is not limited by the region. It always follows you, regardless of where you go, you are always trapped in yourself. Take this (the ring engraved on Tiffany). I’ve been wearing it for a long time. I don’t want it anymore.
Holly woke up in Paul’s sharp criticism. She got out of the taxi and rushed into the rain to find Paul. She finally woke up from this flashy daydream and grasped the happiness around her.
Metaphors in stories
Tiffany’s breakfast as the title itself is a symbol. It symbolizes Holly’s dream of yearning for the upper class, and is a flashy daydream of a poor girl. Of course, Holly’s pursuit of vanity is not just to find rich people to marry. In fact, she is more like pursuing a peaceful and warm dream, which is based on the insecurity of wandering in her childhood. The flashiness of money and wealth is safe for her.
The cat is an entity and a symbol in the play. The cat symbolizes Holly’s arrogant and realistic side of her character. However, the absence of name and attribution is also a true portrayal of her psychological situation. The abandoned cat was picked up by Holly, who was also adrift, but Holly, who did not find a safe home, did not give her name because she did not want to establish a close relationship with anything before the daydream came true.
Holly plays and sings the Moon River by herself, which is still a commendable segment, and is also a rare picture in the film that shows Holly’s innocence in her heart. There are many anthropomorphic metaphors in the lyrics of Moon River, which brings us infinitely close to Holly’s heart. The moon is pure and beautiful in Greek mythology, but it is also endowed with mysterious, changeable and illusory images in western culture. It can be said that the Moon River symbolizes Holly’s unreal dream that is difficult to realize.
“Breakfast of Tiffany” shows us a gold-fearing girl who wants to enter the upper class. In the process of pursuing the flashy dream, she faces the temptation of money, love, fame and wealth, and after experiencing setbacks such as the death of loved ones and the abandonment of loved ones, she can see through the wealth and prosperity in the world, and finally finds the pure herself in the memory and the innocence in the heart.
Beautiful dreams are fragile and flashy. I hope readers can keep their innocence and find their ordinary happiness.
