Bonnie and Clyde Literary Elements

Arthur Penn

Faye Dunaway, Warren Beatty

Gene Hackman, Estelle Parsons, Gene Wilder

Crime, Drama, Comedy

English

Academy Award for Best Cinematography and for Best Supporting Actress (Estelle Parsons)

August 13, 1967

Warren Beatty

Texas during the Great Depression

No narrator or specific point of view. Mostly follows the exploits of Bonnie and Clyde.

At times comic, slapstick, and lighthearted. At others, violent, dramatic, disturbing, and tragic.

Protagonist: Bonnie & Clyde; Antagonist: Frank Hammer

The major conflict is that because they have been robbing banks and killing people along the way, Bonnie and Clyde are wanted by the law and must escape arrest and execution.

The climax occurs at the very end when the two criminals are gunned down by the authorities.

There is a significant disproportion between how Bonnie and Clyde perceive their lives and the direness of their plight. While they act as though it's all fun and games, the viewer perceives that they are getting into more and more difficult circumstances and ruining their lives.

While there are no formal innovations, the film is credited with bringing a new kind of emotional honesty and unique tonality to American cinema. Arthur Penn's unflinching approach to sex, violence, and crime, and his willingness to put comedy and tragedy so closely side-by-side was considered innovative by critics and viewers alike.

While there are no allusions in the content of the film, some of the tonal juxtapositions and filming techniques are allusions to the French New Wave, particularly the work of Godard and Truffaut, both of whom were approached to direct the film.

Bonnie wants to live at home and she and Clyde want to settle down and have a normal life even though they have made choices that have completely excluded that from ever being a possibility.

Bonnie and Blanche are set in parallel as two very different kinds of women.