Arthur Penn’s controversial Bonnie and Clyde was one of the first works to cross cultural boundaries in the early days of the New Hollywood revolution. At this time, by pure coincidence, major movie studios finally realized that a large number of moviegoers (i.e. baby boomers) were losing interest in historical blockbusters, war movies, and westerns, and decided to try to save the industry. In desperation, they handed over the reins to artists and filmmakers. A management team that understood what this emerging generation wanted. Rock and roll had been around for over a decade at this point, but beat poetry and protest music were all the rage. Audiences wanted a movie that would burn with the same fire of discontent that fueled all the other arts they were absorbing and inhaling at the time. They wanted to be challenged.
“Bonnie and Clyde” didn’t just pose a challenge for moviegoers. It shocked them. Many people liked this. some, Like New York Times Chief Film Critic Bosley Crowtheractively pushed back.
Crowther’s critique became notorious as a castrating cultural establishment’s rant against the burgeoning counterculture’s easy-going nihilism. “This film treats the horrific depredations of these two vulgar idiots as if they were as fun and frolic as the Jazz Age cut-ups of Thoroughly Modern Millie. “It’s a cheap slapstick comedy with a bald face,” Krauser wrote. He wasn’t alone in hating the glorification of Bonnie Parker (Faye Dunaway) and Clyde Barrow (Warren Beatty). Historians and living contemporaries strongly objected to the film upon its release, and with good reason. Penn and the screenwriting duo of Robert Benton and David Newman took liberties with the factual record. What did they get wrong or misrepresent?
The Incredibly True, Half-Fabricated Adventures of Bonnie and Clyde
One major departure from the historical record concerns Bonnie Parker’s physical condition by the end of the film. In real life, she was burned and disabled after surviving a pretty bad car accident. Perhaps this was omitted due to the difficulty of applying make-up (according to one account, her skin was burnt down to the bone in places) and the unfortunate nature of Bonnie’s feisty nature, which left her seriously injured. expensive. Oddly enough, the film’s depiction of Buck Barrow (Gene Hackman) dying and his wife Blanche Barrow (Estelle Parsons) being shot while on the run before being arrested was completely fabricated. . In fact, she escaped the scrape unscathed, and of course Clyde didn’t kill the police officer by getting her shot.
Clyde did However, it kills just like Bonnie. Although they were often kind enough to their captives (giving them money to get home), they valued self-preservation first and foremost. That’s what you can feel from the movie. But did they really send photos and poems to the press while on the run? No, all of these items were discovered post-mortem, including the famous photo of Bonnie pointing a shotgun at Clyde.
The depiction of Texas Ranger Frank Hamer (Denver Pyle) as incompetent and incompetent was so off the mark that his family sued the producers for defamation and settled for an undisclosed amount. There is also debate about the final scene of the movie. Do you like moments of silence punctuated by rustling sounds, the sound of bird wings, and a hail of gunshots? Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case in real life. According to people at the scene, Bonnie and Clyde were still driving when the Rangers began to explode.
Another person who took offense to her portrayal was the real Blanche Barrow. Although Parsons won an Academy Award for her performance, Blanche was less than happy to be portrayed as, in her words, “a screaming horse’s ass.”
Do these revelations make you think less of “Bonnie and Clyde”? It shouldn’t.
Why some strategic fantasies are better than the whole truth
As a historical drama, “Bonnie and Clyde” stays true to the spirit of the outlaws’ criminal activities, but streamlined to better tell a propulsive story. Name a great historical film and dig into the scholarship surrounding it, and you’ll find that considerable liberties are taken to do justice to the life and times of its subject.
Sure, “Bonnie and Clyde” is a cultural discussion starter, but that has nothing to do with its contribution to the historical record. The main complaint about the film was that, as Crowther claimed at the time of its release, it was a very cynical depiction of the journey of none other than Robin Hood, with a few kids who are content to kill people. It’s about being something. I think that’s the delicious danger of Penn’s films (hardly new at the time, with Joseph H. Lewis’s Gun Crazy and countless other mob and gangster films in its wake). : We are captivated by Bonnie and Clyde’s brazen deeds from beginning to end, and we are do We want them to get away even though we’ve seen them kill at least one innocent person.
Perhaps one day a talented young filmmaker will create a naturalistic, candid version of the Bonnie and Clyde legend. But for now, we have a masterpiece that obscures this truth that still holds true 57 years later.
