Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde

This volume contains essays on Arthur Penn's film Bonnie and Clyde.

Lester D. Friedman (Edited by)

9780521596978, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 28 December 1999

230 pages, 34 b/w illus.
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.3 cm, 0.34 kg

Few films in the history of American cinema caused more intense critical discussion and greater emotional debate than Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde. This provocative portrayal of Depression-era life on the run, delivered with visual panache and a hip sensibility, ushered in what came to be categorized as 'the New American Cinema'. Focusing on a story set in the 1930s, yet clearly fashioned to resonate with the countercultural tenor of the 1960s, the film remains compelling for today's viewers by virtue of its central love story and inevitable tragedy, its subversive statement as well as its sympathetic connection to the communal impulse. This volume includes commissioned essays by leading scholars of Arthur Penn's work, as well as contributions from Penn himself and scriptwriter David Newman. They analyze the cultural history, technical brilliance, visual strategies, and violent imagery that marked Bonnie and Clyde as a significant turning point in American film.

Introduction: Arthur Penn's Enduring Gangsters Lester Friedman
1. Making waves: the directing of Bonnie and Clyde Arthur Penn
2. What's it really all about?: pictures at an execution David Newman
3. 'It's never the way I knew them': searching for Bonnie and Clyde Diane Carson
4. From 'fucking cops!' to 'fucking media!': Bonnie and Clyde for a Sixties America Steve Carr
5. Model criminals: a visual analysis of Bonnie and Clyde Matthew Bernstein
6. The haemorrhaging of American cinema: Bonnie and Clyde's legacy of film violence Stephen Prince
7. Erasure and taboo: a queer reading of Bonnie and Clyde Liora Moriel
Reviews of Bonnie and Clyde
Filmography
Select bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Films, cinema [APF]