Bonnie and Clyde(1967)

Bonnie and Clyde is a 1967 American biographical crime film directed by Arthur Penn and starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the...

Bonnie and Clyde is a 1967 American biographical crime film directed by Arthur Penn and starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the title characters Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker. The film also features Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, and Estelle Parsons. The screenplay is by David Newman and Robert Benton. Robert Towne and Beatty provided uncredited contributions to the script; Beatty produced the film. The music is by Charles Strouse. {full_page}

Bonnie and Clyde is considered one of the first films of the New Hollywood era and a landmark picture. It broke many cinematic taboos and for some members of the counterculture, the film was considered a "rallying cry". Its success prompted other filmmakers to be more open in presenting sex and violence in their films. The film's ending became iconic as "one of the bloodiest death scenes in cinematic history."

The film received Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actress (Estelle Parsons) and Best Cinematography (Burnett Guffey). In 1992, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

During the Great Depression, Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker of Texas meet when Clyde tries to steal Bonnie's mother's car. Bonnie, who is bored by her job as a waitress, is intrigued by Clyde and decides to take up with him and become his partner in crime. They pull off some holdups, but their amateur efforts, while exciting, are not very lucrative.

The duo's crime spree shifts into high gear once they hook up with a dim-witted gas station attendant, C.W. Moss. Clyde's older brother Buck and his wife, Blanche, a preacher's daughter, also join them. The two women dislike each other at first sight, and their antipathy escalates. Blanche has nothing but disdain for Bonnie, Clyde, and C.W., while Bonnie sees Blanche's flightiness as a constant danger to the gang's survival.

Bonnie and Clyde turn from small-time heists to bank robbing. Their exploits also become more violent. After C.W. botches parking during a bank robbery and delays their escape, Clyde shoots the bank manager in the face when he jumps onto the slow-moving car's running board. In Joplin, Missouri, local police drive to the hideout thinking the gang are bootleggers; two policeman are killed in a shootout. The gang is pursued by law enforcement, including Texas Ranger Frank Hamer, whom they capture and humiliate before setting him free. A raid later catches the outlaws off guard in which more law officers are killed, Buck is mortally wounded by a shot to his head, and Blanche is injured in the eye. Bonnie, Clyde, and C.W. barely escape alive. With Blanche sightless and in police custody, Hamer tricks her into revealing C.W.'s name (until then he was only an "unidentified suspect").

Hamer finds Bonnie, Clyde, and C.W. hiding at the house of C.W.'s father Ivan, who thinks the couple have corrupted his son (as evidenced by an ornate tattoo Bonnie convinced C.W. to get). The elder Moss strikes a bargain with Hamer: in exchange for leniency for C.W., he sets a trap for the outlaws. When Bonnie and Clyde stop on the side of the road to help Mr. Moss fix a flat tire, the police in the bushes open fire and riddle them with bullets. Hamer and his posse come out of hiding and look pensively at the couple's bodies as a nearby flock of swallows flies away.

Cast  :

Warren Beatty as Clyde Barrow 

Faye Dunaway as Bonnie Parker

Michael J. Pollard as C.W. Moss 

Gene Hackman as Buck Barrow 

Estelle Parsons as Blanche 

Denver Pyle as Frank Hamer

Dub Taylor as Ivan Moss 

Evans Evans as Velma Davis 

Gene Wilder as Eugene Grizzard

The film was intended as a romantic and comic version of the violent gangster films of the 1930s, updated with modern filmmaking techniques. Arthur Penn portrayed some of the violent scenes with a comic tone, sometimes reminiscent of Keystone Kops-style slapstick films, then shifted disconcertingly into horrific and graphic violence. The film has the French New Wave directors' influence, both in its rapid shifts of tone, and in its choppy editing, which is particularly noticeable in its closing sequence. The first handling of the script was in the early 1960s. Influenced by the French New Wave writers and not yet completed, Newman and Benton sent Penn an early draft. He already was engaged in production decisions for The Chase (1966) and could not get involved in the script for Bonnie and Clyde. The writers sent their script to François Truffaut, who made contributions but passed on the project, next directing Fahrenheit 451. At Truffaut's suggestion, the writers, much excited (the film's producers were less so), approached filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard. Some sources claim Godard did not trust Hollywood and refused; Benton claimed that Godard wanted to shoot the film in New Jersey in January during the winter. He purportedly took offense when would-be producer Norah Wright objected that his desire was unreasonable, as the story took place in Texas, which has a warm climate year-round. Her partner Elinor Jones claimed the two did not believe Godard was right for the project in the first place. Godard's retort: «Je vous parle de cinéma, vous me parlez de météo. Au revoir.» ("I'm talking cinema and you're talking weather. Goodbye.") After the 1968 Academy Awards, Godard sent Benton and Newman a cable that read, "Now, let's make it all over again!"

Soon after the failed negotiations for production, Beatty was visiting Paris and learned through Truffaut of the project and its path. On returning to Hollywood, Beatty requested to see the script and bought the rights. A meeting with Godard was not productive. Beatty changed his approach and convinced the writers that while the script at first reading was very much of the French New Wave style, an American director was necessary for the subject.

Beatty offered the directing position to George Stevens, William Wyler, Karel Reisz, John Schlesinger, Brian G. Hutton, and Sydney Pollack, all of whom turned it down. Penn turned it down several times before Beatty finally convinced him to direct the film.Beatty was entitled to 40% of the profits of the film and gave Penn 10%.

When Beatty was on board as producer only, his sister and actress Shirley MacLaine was a strong possibility to play Bonnie. When Beatty decided to play Clyde, they needed a different actress. Considered for the role were Jane Fonda, Tuesday Weld, Ann-Margret, Sharon Tate, Leslie Caron, Carol Lynley and Sue Lyon. Cher auditioned for the part, and Beatty begged Natalie Wood to play the role. Wood declined, to concentrate on her therapy, and acknowledged that working with Beatty before had been "difficult". Faye Dunaway later said that she won the part "by the skin of her teeth!"

The film is forthright in its handling of sexuality, but that theme was toned down from its conception. Originally, Benton and Newman wrote Clyde as bisexual. He and Bonnie were to have a three-way sexual relationship with their male getaway driver. Penn persuaded the writers that since the couple's relationship was underwritten in terms of emotional complexity, it dissipated the passion of the title characters. This would threaten the audience's sympathy for the characters, and might result in their being written off as sexual deviants because they were criminals. Others said that Beatty was unwilling to have his character display that kind of sexuality and that the Production Code would never have allowed such content in the first place. Clyde is portrayed as heterosexual and impotent.

Bonnie and Clyde was one of the first films to feature extensive use of squibs—small explosive charges, often mounted with bags of stage blood, that detonate inside an actor's clothes to simulate bullet hits. Released in an era when film shootings were generally depicted as bloodless and painless, the Bonnie and Clyde death scene was one of the first in mainstream American cinema to be depicted with graphic realism.

Beatty originally wanted the film to be shot in black and white, but Warner Bros. rejected the idea. Much of the studio's senior management was hostile to the film, especially Jack L. Warner, who considered the subject matter an unwanted throwback to Warner Bros.' early period, when gangster films were common product.Moreover, Warner was already annoyed at Beatty for refusing to star in PT 109 and defying Warner's favorite gesture of authority of showing the studio water tower with the WB logo on it. Beatty said, "Well, it's got your name, but it's got my initials." Warner complained about the costs of the film's extensive location shooting in Texas, which exceeded its production schedule and budget, and ordered the crew back to the studio backlot. It already had planned to return for final process shots.

Music : "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" by Flatt and Scruggs, the instrumental banjo piece, was introduced to a worldwide audience as a result of its frequent use in the movie. Its use is anachronistic because bluegrass dates from the mid-1940s rather than the 1930s. But the functionally similar old-time music genre was long established and widely recorded in the period of the film's events. Long out of print in vinyl and cassette formats, the film soundtrack was released on CD in 2009.

The film considerably simplifies the lives of Bonnie and Clyde and their gang. They were allied with other gang members, were jailed repeatedly, and committed other murders. In the part of the movie where Bonnie and Clyde escape the ambush that killed Buck Barrow and captured Blanche, Bonnie is shown being wounded by a deputy sheriff who is then killed by Clyde. In fact, although they did escape the ambush, no lawmen were killed, although between June 1933 and April 1934 the Barrow gang did kill three law officers in Texas and Oklahoma. On the run, they suffered a horrific auto accident in which Parker was severely burned and left a near-invalid. In the scene depicting Bonnie and Clyde's death, they are portrayed as having stopped their automobile, with Clyde exiting the car and then looking back at Bonnie as they realize they've been trapped, but reports state that the car was still moving when lawmen opened fire.

Origin Wikipedia...