Film Response: Bonnie and Clyde

 A brief response for UW's CMS 270: New Hollywood class regarding the 1967 film "Bonnie and Clyde," focusing on its genre and Hollywood standards of the time. 

Bonnie and Clyde reframes the ideal of the "all-American Hero," not only through the humanization of two criminals, but also through its reframing of law enforcement and the general attitude toward poverty in a time rife with empathy for the working class. Outlaws and gangster films often have us rooting against the law, but gentler moments in this film between the titular duo humanize them and generate an almost unwarranted sympathy for the anti-heroes. The film departs from Hollywood norms (at least of the time) by showing brutal violence alongside incredibly intimate scenes -- it pushes taboo on both sides, and that's not a mistake. Violating moral standards of Hollywood by showing both violence and sexual content, the piece consistently pushes the gauntlet while also bearing the brunt of criticism from different angles. If anything, by the end of the film, the romance between the duo is further humanized as they get to know one another (i.e. the scene in the field where Clyde asks Bonnie about her experience with him). Restraint is shown in sexual content by modern standards, but decreases as the picture progresses, both in depictions of sex and of violence.

The film is almost a western, at least I believe there is a strong case for it. While it definitely also aligns itself with many tropes and themes present in gangster films; the setting and emphasis on the working class/seeing the law as something to be outrun instead of hidden from indicates at least an inclination towards the themes of westerns. Bonnie’s agency is unique of either prescribed genre, however, since she has both agency and intellect, which is not typically how women are depicted under either label. Bonnie and Clyde’s youth, romance, and dynamics plant themselves firmly as a main draw of the film; they’re humanized by each other in a way that gangers, outlaws, and criminals in films typically are not. Their power comes from a sense of freedom rather than of power, which turns the nail on its head no matter what label this film is placed under.