Saturday, October 02, 2010
Their nature is raw, they hate all law

They know the law always wins
They've been shot at before, but they do not ignore
That death is the wages of sin.
Someday they'll go down together
And they'll bury them side by side
To few it'll be grief, to the law a relief
But it's death for Bonnie and Clyde.
"The Story of Bonnie and Clyde,"
a poem by Bonnie Parker
By Edward Copeland
Forty years ago today, a landmark film was released, a film that caused critical spats and even encouraged some famed critics to change their minds. That film was Bonnie and Clyde and it remains great until this day. In fact, it still has some, such as A.O. Scott in Sunday's New York Times, questioning whether its mix of humor and violence was a bad thing and that his ancient predecessor Bosley Crowther might have been right by being dismissive of it. Phooey on them. Just because imitators suck, that doesn't mean the original isn't still peerless.










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Labels: 60s, Arthur Penn, Dub Taylor, Dunaway, Hackman, Loy, Movie Tributes, Oliver Stone, Renoir, W. Beatty
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After reading Scott's piece, I am trying my best to remain calm. The whole essay is typical Timesian thumbsucking, going on forever and saying nothing, until the end when he throws in the sucker punch: Crowther was right. NO, HE WASN'T! "Bonnie and Clyde" remains a perfect work of art, mixing humor, violence, outlaw glamour and French New Wave rhythms. It is as alive and exciting today as the day it was released. It never, ever, gets old. It's odd to read this right after I finished watching Arthur Penn's "The Missouri Breaks." As I was watching that, I kept thinking to myself, "This is no Bonnie and Clyde." But, then, nothing is. Perhaps, this is all an attempt by Tony Scott to resurrect Crowther's reputation in the vague hope that someday somebody at the Times will do the same for him. What's next: The misunderstood Rex Reed?
Nice work, Edward - an elegant summary of one of the best films ever made, and one which does it justice. You've encapsulated the qualities that make Bonnie and Clyde not just a revolutionary work of art, but a peerless piece of entertainment. This is one of those flicks that I can watch tens of thousands of times and never cease to view it with wonder and awe. The genius of Penn's work lies in his juxtaposition of elements - comic and tragic, lyrical and grotesque, traditional and subversive (the film pays homage to the classic ganster film, while at the same blowing the genre wide open). What I find fascinating about the film is the manner in which it so succesfully conveys the almost mythological aspects of the Bonnie and Clyde legend, while never losing sight of of the gritty, ugly realities around which it took shape. The audience can at once both appreciate the characters as folk heroes with a sort of larger-than-life status, without ever forgetting what profoundly ordinary people they really were - ignorant, uncomprehending, and deeply, deeply flawed. Not many films that have tried for a similar effect have been able to sustain the balance - usually we get either deification (the outlaw as a rebel God, a hero the audience can root for) or a thorough debunking of the myth (bare-knuckled realism in which the outlaw is stripped of all his mystique and reduced to wretchedness). It's not many films that locate the fine line in between - something which gives us a much fuller understanding of both the manner in which perception and reality are informed by each other, and the sharp ways in which they diverge. Bonnie and Clyde is not a film that offers any easy answers - which is why the Bosley Crowthers of the world were so freaked out by it. Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow are neither the good guys nor the bad guys - you can't shoehorn all the complexities of human behavior into comfortable little category boxes.
Shamus: What's next: The misunderstood Rex Reed?
Ooh! Ooh! Can I write this one? :) Can I call it "The Retched [sic] Rex Reed?"
When the House did that piece on life changing criticism, one of my 5 moments was Bosley Crowther's takedown of Bonnie and Clyde: "For someone so upset by the film's violence, he sure can't stop talking about it."
I don't know what to take from A.O. Scott's article at all. Crowther wasn't even remotely right. Reading Scott, I imagined some editor at the NY Times was holding him at gunpoint; the article spins around and around like the Wheel of Fortune and lands on bankrupt. There was no justification in his statements. It just seemed like the popular thing to say. Bonnie and Clyde begets Hostel? Gimme a break!
As for Bonnie and Clyde, two words prevent it from being classified a true masterpiece by me: Estelle Parsons. She and Shirley Booth should both be packed into a rocket with their Oscars and shot into a histrionic version of Outer Space. The real Blanche said Parsons played her "like a screaming horse's ass." Man does she nail it. As much as I love everything else about the film, whenever I watch it, I find myself fast forwarding whenever she's on. I react to her performance the way Josh R. would react if he woke up Krazy-Glued to Jessica Lange.
Granted, Parsons' performance doesn't ruin the movie--in the grand scheme, she's more a wretched nuisance than completely destructive--but I'd be a liar if I said she was anything but awful.
Ooh! Ooh! Can I write this one? :) Can I call it "The Retched [sic] Rex Reed?"
When the House did that piece on life changing criticism, one of my 5 moments was Bosley Crowther's takedown of Bonnie and Clyde: "For someone so upset by the film's violence, he sure can't stop talking about it."
I don't know what to take from A.O. Scott's article at all. Crowther wasn't even remotely right. Reading Scott, I imagined some editor at the NY Times was holding him at gunpoint; the article spins around and around like the Wheel of Fortune and lands on bankrupt. There was no justification in his statements. It just seemed like the popular thing to say. Bonnie and Clyde begets Hostel? Gimme a break!
As for Bonnie and Clyde, two words prevent it from being classified a true masterpiece by me: Estelle Parsons. She and Shirley Booth should both be packed into a rocket with their Oscars and shot into a histrionic version of Outer Space. The real Blanche said Parsons played her "like a screaming horse's ass." Man does she nail it. As much as I love everything else about the film, whenever I watch it, I find myself fast forwarding whenever she's on. I react to her performance the way Josh R. would react if he woke up Krazy-Glued to Jessica Lange.
Granted, Parsons' performance doesn't ruin the movie--in the grand scheme, she's more a wretched nuisance than completely destructive--but I'd be a liar if I said she was anything but awful.
While Estelle Parsons didn't grate on me, the Oscar for supporting actress really belonged to Anne Bancroft if they'd put her in the correct category and then Faye should have won lead.
Yup, yup, yup. Second everyone here, especially the Shamus. I'll reproduce what I said at my place, since it really belongs here:
think Scott is far too serious a critic to indulge in contrarianism for its own sake, but his fundamental point is just plain wrong. Movie violence does not exist in a vacuum and each violent movie has to come up with its artistic and thematic rationale for depicting horrific acts. Bonnie and Clyde didn't ring down the curtain on those debates. The mere fact that he references Saw and Hostel should ring a gong--did we not see the blogosphere erupt in a very serious discussion of the violence in those movies? I was in the anti- camp there, and nobody called me square, a fussbudget or a philistine. At least, not to my (virtual) face ...
And I should add that I am re-reading "Since Yesterday," Frederick Lewis Allen's social history of the 1930s. It was written in 1941 so it has great immediacy, and the sheer godawfulness of the Depression is depicted with great force. Bonnie and Clyde gets that absolutely, perfectly right, as Edward points out here. The filmmakers are at great pains to illustrate not only the outlaws' lives, but why they appealed to the Depression-blasted masses. And what is this from Scott, about the killing of the bank employee having "no real question of self-defense"? that isn't how I saw the scene.
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think Scott is far too serious a critic to indulge in contrarianism for its own sake, but his fundamental point is just plain wrong. Movie violence does not exist in a vacuum and each violent movie has to come up with its artistic and thematic rationale for depicting horrific acts. Bonnie and Clyde didn't ring down the curtain on those debates. The mere fact that he references Saw and Hostel should ring a gong--did we not see the blogosphere erupt in a very serious discussion of the violence in those movies? I was in the anti- camp there, and nobody called me square, a fussbudget or a philistine. At least, not to my (virtual) face ...
And I should add that I am re-reading "Since Yesterday," Frederick Lewis Allen's social history of the 1930s. It was written in 1941 so it has great immediacy, and the sheer godawfulness of the Depression is depicted with great force. Bonnie and Clyde gets that absolutely, perfectly right, as Edward points out here. The filmmakers are at great pains to illustrate not only the outlaws' lives, but why they appealed to the Depression-blasted masses. And what is this from Scott, about the killing of the bank employee having "no real question of self-defense"? that isn't how I saw the scene.
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