Review of Bonnie & Clyde, directed by Arthur Penn

If you’ve stumbled upon this blog through the depths of Google and the Internet, welcome! This is my website. It started out as an author and writer website, but then I expanded it into a blog during the pandemic to archive all of the books, movies, and television shows I was watching during this time.

Nowadays it’s become a vital income source for me, as I unexpectedly became unemployed during a time I was said to be guaranteed something. So if you end up liking what you’re reading, then click around for a bit and don’t block the ads that are popping up in the corners.

That said, let’s get more into the context of this post. As a kid I didn’t really have friends, as I was a major introvert even then, and I would read up on history because I thought it was cool. It was indeed cool, but one of the historical events and people I read about as a kid was Bonnie and Clyde and their exploits across the US.

I ended up watching the Bonnie & Clyde movie my junior and final year of college. I was enrolled in a film criticism course and another one in introduction to film with all of the film majors, and we were forced to watch this movie in the context of understanding how controversial it was in industry and the United States.

I’ve been revisiting old movies and television shows I watched throughout the years on my blog lately, to kick back into the nostalgia gear, and this is one of the movies I revisited. I’ve been watching a bunch of older movies lately in general because I enrolled back into my Criterion subscription.

Enough with the context—I don’t want to bore you with the details so soon! Let’s get into the review.

During the Great Depression, Bonnie and Clyde meet, fall in love, and also fall into crime.

This movie takes place during the Great Depression, where, in the United States, a lot of people were suffering because of the stock market crash. The film is set in Texas, and Bonnie Parker meets a boy around her age, Clyde, when he comes around and tries to take her mother’s car.

Instead of being entirely horrified that he just tried to steal from them, Bonnie decides to join him. She’s bored of her life as a waitress and wants something more from life in general, and she sees Clyde as someone who will allow her to be a bit more wild. The two of them then pull off some smaller heists, slowly moving bigger with each successful one.

That said, they eventually end up into straight up robbing some banks. When they meet gas station attendant C.W. Moss, who joins them, they slowly get more violent with the nature of their crimes, and Clyde shoots a bank manager in the face when C.W. messes up their grand escape. They also recruit Clyde’s brother and wife into their operations, and Bonnie hates the wife.

The crew keeps moving across the American South, continuing to steal and rob their away across the landscape. But when a boy is delivering groceries, he spots the crew and tells the police, and two cops end up dead when everyone starts shooting at each other.

This is what becomes the final straw with law enforcement, and they want to get the crew very much at this point. They capture a Texas Ranger named Frank, but they set him free after making fun of him. Another heist is planned, the police are onto them, and they take a guy and his girlfriend hostage for a bit before leaving them behind.

But Bonnie wants to go home to Texas and meet up with her family, which is the beginning of the end. She wants to give them some of the money they earned from stealing, and while Clyde is hesitant to do this, he agrees to her idea. Law enforcement is still after them, and a successful ambush kills one of the crew, leaves the wife in captivity, and C.W., Bonnie, and Clyde narrowly escape into the night.

The wife, Blanche, reveals C.W.’s real name, which is, yet again, the beginning of the end. C.W. takes Bonnie and Clyde to his father’s house to heal, and his father disapproves of all of them being here. He strikes a deal with the police, which grants C.W. immunity in exchange for Bonnie and Clyde.

He has them go out with him, and when his tire goes flat and they come to help him, the police in the bushes gun them down. The cops surrounded their corpses, freshly dead, and look down on the couple.

Overall Thoughts

I think revisiting this film having studied more film history makes me appreciate it more. For those who don’t know, this film was so scandalous because it broke all the conventions set by the Hays Code, and was the first film since the Pre Code era that dare to be this violent and somewhat sexual.

That’s one way to examine the film. The other is viewing its protagonists through critical lens. People might glamorize Bonnie and Clyde, and they certainly do, but they were morally grey as well. In pursuit of more money and fame, they ended up killing quite a few people that weren’t deserving entirely of being killed.

Anyways, I think if you haven’t seen the movie and wanted just the summary, you should go see it anyways. There is a lot to learn from movies like these, especially if you want to examine film through a lens that isn’t just seeing them as entertainment. They’re reflections of the world we live in most of the time, and like most art, it is political to make these kinds of movies.

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