Director: Arthur Penn
Starring: Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, Estelle Parsons, Denver Pyle, Dub Taylor, Evans Evans, Gene Wilder

- Reviewed by Linda

To me, Warren Beatty is one of those actors that always seems to be playing a variation of himself. No matter who he plays—Clyde Barrow, John Reed in Reds, Dick Tracy—I've always felt that his ego as an all-around Hollywood Golden Boy just exudes through the screen, like, "Look at me! You may know me as Warren Beatty: Actor. Or perhaps Warren Beatty: Producer. I'm also quite the ladies' man. Say, what are you doing tonight? Here's my hotel room key..." It's like he has one eye on the camera, and one eye on a mirror. Maybe it's just me, but I've never thought that he's a particularly strong actor (his skills behind the camera are perhaps more admirable).

But in this Hollywood classic, pretty-boy "Warren Beatty As Clyde Barrow" is luckily surrounded by a top-notch cast in a thrilling, violent, and sexy ride that pushed Hollywood barriers. Bonnie and Clyde shocked audiences with its graphic violence—anyone who has seen it remembers its graphic, stunning ending, as our gangster hero and heroine's car is riddled with bullet holes. It also had a distinct sense of glamour and style, and apparently Faye Dunaway's saucy beret caused a fashion sensation in 1967 when the film was released, regardless if her style was historically accurate or not.

Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, at least in the movie, hook up within the first moment they lay eyes on each other. Clyde tries to steal her momma's car, and Bonnie gets so hot n' bothered by this suave crook that she literally tries to jump him immediately. Next thing you know, they are robbing small-town mom-and-pop shops across the "Southwest" (aka Texas and Oklahoma mainly), and soon graduate to robbing banks (which, ironically, don't always have money—this is, after all, the Depression). As their hijinks gain media notoriety, they become a sort of glamorous couple on the lam, sticking it to the man, making them media rock stars of the time when everyday people's lives were destitute. As the Barrow gang picks up members, including a driver named C.W. (the boyish Michael J. Pollard), and Clyde's brother Buck Barrow (Gene Hackman) and sister-in-law Blanche (Estelle Parsons), their heists get bigger, and the stakes higher.

The interesting thing about Bonnie and Clyde is that despite having lots of humor, and more than a little current of sex (Clyde is basically impotent, but Faye Dunaway's sexpot Bonnie is indeed "the best damn girl in Texas"), it doesn't shy away from the results of violence. Though the graphic scenes probably wouldn't make audiences flinch nowadays, I can only imagine the shock of seeing their first victim getting shot in the face without the camera cutting away from the impact. And as their adventure starts to run low on luck, and members of their gang actually get hit by bullets, the pain is real. Try to forget the scene where Estelle Parsons (who won an Oscar in this role) as Blanche, shrieks in hysterics as her husband Buck is circled by a posse of the law one final time in a field.

The extras on the Two-Disc Special Edition are great, with Warren Beatty's wardrobe tests (where, despite the lack of sound, you can see his interest in lighting and positioning—a director in the making); three featurettes about the film, featuring all the major players talking about the film; a History Channel documentary called "Love and Death: The Story of Bonnie and Clyde", which shows that much of the film was quite fictionalized; two interesting deleted scenes (subtitled, because the sound was lost); and a couple of original trailers.

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