It is as if great actor Philip Seymour Hoffman’s tragic premature death has been implied in most of his roles, and especially in his most important ones for which he was also nominated for an Oscar and won one of them for his title role in the biographical drama Capote. All his important roles, such as those in the excellent crime drama Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead directed by Sidney Lumet, impressive dark and humorous existential mosaic-drama Hapiness by Todd Solondz, bizarre masterpiece Synecdoche, New York by Charlie Kaufman, fascinating Master by Paul Thomas Anderson and Capote by Bennet Miller, are characterized by the pronounced trait of Hoffman’s self-destructiveness and readiness to go over the edge of psycho-physical endurance, reflected in his at times almost sadistic relationship to his own corporeality.

When creating the psychological profiles of the characters he played, regardless whether they were real people such as Truman Capote or ordinary everyday people defined by their social contexts and at a first glance completely uninteresting and trivial existence, Hoffman always created layers of darkly nuanced anti-social and manipulative behavior, misanthropy, hypocrisy, egoism and revolting psychological state. Although in Capote, which is shown within the In Memoriam program devoted to actors and directors who passed away in 2014, he demonstrated a tendency towards overacting and mannerism, even that role is another proof that Philip Seymour Hoffman’s most natural acting habitus were roles of morally dubious and sometimes shameless characters destined for defeat. (Josip Grozdanić)