Bonnie and Clyde · reception & legacy

1967 · Arthur Penn

How Bonnie and Clyde has been received, argued over, and remembered.

The arc

Slaughtered by the old-guard critics on release in 1967 — the NYT's Bosley Crowther panned it repeatedly — then rescued by Pauline Kael's landmark New Yorker defense and a wildly successful re-release; it went from scandal to Best Picture nominee to founding text of New Hollywood.

What's debated

Fans still argue over whether it glamorizes its outlaws or indicts the audience for wanting them glamorized — the same fight the critics had in 1967.

Its footprint

"We rob banks" is one of the most quoted introductions in movies, the slow-motion finale is endlessly imitated and parodied, and Faye Dunaway's beret-and-neckerchief look set off a real-world fashion craze.

Where it stands

A load-bearing pillar of the canon — the film everyone points to as the moment American movies changed — so it's less rediscovered than perpetually re-argued.

★ Did you know? Screenwriters Robert Benton and David Newman wrote it hoping the French New Wave would come to them: François Truffaut was courted to direct (he gave script notes instead) and Jean-Luc Godard was also approached before Warren Beatty — who produced the film at 29 — brought it to Arthur Penn.

Named by the director

Influences Arthur Penn has publicly named — the director's own word, distinct from the inferred lines of influence.

Akira Kurosawa — Penn cited Kurosawa's use of slow motion in depicting violence as the model for the film's balletic final ambush.