Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie and Clyde is a 1967 American biographical crime film directed by Arthur Penn and starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the title characters Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker. Also featured were Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, and Estelle Parsons. The screenplay was written by David Newman and Robert Benton. Robert Towne and Beatty provided uncredited contributions to the script; Beatty produced the film. The soundtrack was composed by Charles Strouse.
Bonnie and Clyde is considered one of the first films of the New Hollywood era and a landmark film. It broke many cinematic taboos and for some members of the counterculture, the film was considered to be a "rallying cry."  Its success prompted other filmmakers to be more open in presenting sex and violence in their films. The film's ending became iconic as "one of the bloodiest death scenes in cinematic history."... It was among the first 100 films selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."
(Read more at Wikipedia)
== Links to Peel ==
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Peel referred to Bonnie and Clyde disapprovingly when guest-writing Disc & Music Echo's "Hit Talk" feature in the issue of 20 January 1968 and discussing the Top 20 singles. Commenting on "The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde" by Georgie Fame, nothing to do with the soundtrack but seemingly inspired by the characters in the film, he wrote:
: Not having seen "Bonnie and Clyde" I'm very sceptical about its value as a work of art, and not a little worried about turning murderers into folk heroes. But the record's OK, though not at all in Georgie's style
In the following week's issue of Disc, on the "Pop Post" page, one reader was critical of his remarks:
: "Disc jockey John Peel must be the only critic in history to admit that he hadn't seen anything and then go and slam it anyway! In "Hit Talk" (20.1.68) he says he's "very sceptical" of "Bonnie and Clyde" as a work of art and "not a little worried" about turning murderers into folk heroes. Really, Mr. Peel? And what about Robin Hood, Dick Turpin, Billy The Kid, Bluebeard and a host of others....what harm has been done to others because these often vicious characters have gained wide notoriety? There seems to be a wide discrepancy between how Mr. Peel's idealistic eyes look at things and the way things actually are" .
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But as Wikipedia points out, the film did appeal to a young audience and the soundtrack included Flatt and Scruggs' bluegrass instrumental "Foggy Mountain Breakdown", which was a US and UK hit, was covered on a 1968 Peel session by Tim Rose and sampled in 1999 by the Cuban Boys . Bonnie and Clyde's stars, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, were of the "New Hollywood" generation, who mixed with rock stars; in the 1970s Dunaway was married for a time to Peter Wolf, singer with the J. Geils Band; Melody Maker's Chris Charlesworth, then the paper's Los Angeles correspondent, describes meeting them here.
It is not known whether Peel eventually saw "Bonnie and Clyde", although the fllm has since been shown many times on British TV.
== External Links ==
* Wikipedia
* IMDb
Category:Films