Film of the Day: 12
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
"They're young, they're in love and they kill people". This was the tagline for the 1967 film about the famous Bonnie and Clyde who were killed by the police in an ambush today in 1934 in Black Lake, Louisiana. It ended up being arguably the best film of the year and was almost never made as Warner Bros had pretty much no faith in the film.
It was not easy to make a film like this back then as the gangster genre was pretty much dead and the studios thought nobody would want to see the film, yet Warren Beatty did everything he could to get the film made as he knew it would be a hit, boy was he right.
It was the first of its kind to show such violence or gore in a film, as previous films showing gun shots would have not been shot in one shot, there’d be a shot of the gun shot itself and then another showing the repercussion. Yet in this film we see the shot and the repercussion with all the blood and gore that came with it all in one shot, so the audience sees everything making it very revolutionary and controversial. There’s a scene when a piece of Clyde’s head is blown away from one of the bullets, director Arthur Penn wanted to remind the audience of the Kennedy assassination.
As this film was influenced by previous films (mainly the under-rated ‘Gun Crazy’ from 1950) and paying homage to the gangster films of the 30's and 40's, it also became a major influence, influencing many films after, mainly Peckinpah’s masterpiece ‘The Wild Bunch’. And it is because of this film that we today witness such realistic violence in films.
Click here for the trailer
It was not easy to make a film like this back then as the gangster genre was pretty much dead and the studios thought nobody would want to see the film, yet Warren Beatty did everything he could to get the film made as he knew it would be a hit, boy was he right.
It was the first of its kind to show such violence or gore in a film, as previous films showing gun shots would have not been shot in one shot, there’d be a shot of the gun shot itself and then another showing the repercussion. Yet in this film we see the shot and the repercussion with all the blood and gore that came with it all in one shot, so the audience sees everything making it very revolutionary and controversial. There’s a scene when a piece of Clyde’s head is blown away from one of the bullets, director Arthur Penn wanted to remind the audience of the Kennedy assassination.
 |
| The Real Bonnie & Clyde |
Click here for the trailer
Now here is one of my favorite picture....this was probably a surprise hit because it was something different, like when 'jaws' came out. I liked them both but this film kind left an impression on me....a good one with great actors to boot!
ReplyDeleteGreat review by the way....
ya and one of your favourite actors too... Gene Hackman
ReplyDelete