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Violence v. Innocence
The film Bonnie and Clyde(1967) arrived at a time when films were losing their
edge to reality. Still deeply influenced by the recentlyabandoned film morality codes,
movie studios refrained from producing films that depicted violence. But at the same
time, America was a nation waking up to violence, and quickly losing its innocence.
Bonnie and Clyde challenged these unspoken codes and spoke violence to a nation who
was ready to hear it.
The late 1960’s was a challenging time for us Americans. When Bonnie and Clyde
was released in 1967, we were still reeling from the assassination of our president just four
short years before, facing an unknown enemy in a war that was still escalating, and
watching scenes of police brutality and social revolt in our homes every night on
television. It was a time when we were quickly losing our innocence and our heroes.
Bonnie and Clyde exemplifies these new times by leading the protagonists through a
similar transition.
The film opens in perfect innocence. We see a woman, Bonnie, standing naked in
her room in a small farmhouse in the middle of Anytown USA. Almost like Eve in Eden,
we learn through the visual imagery of her looking through the bars at the foot of her bed,
that she feels trapped in her small town and is longing for adventure. This image also
serves to perhaps foreshadow her potential criminal fate. Clyde, being caught in the act of
trying to steal Bonnie’s mother’s car, is like a little school boy in search of excitement.
The first sequence in Bonnie’s home town serve to depict two people, brought together by
fate, who with each other, become something more than either of them would have ever
become. The first robbery, in fact, is committed by Clyde simply to show Bonnie that he
could do it.
Clyde’s depiction as an unsure lover only serves to further this innocence.
Throughout a good majority of the film, Clyde seems not just unwilling, but unable to
make love to Bonnie. This is in stark contrast to the leading alpha male roles of this movie
period, and serves again to compare Clyde to an innocent school boy. As the film
progresses and the couple’s adventures become more violent, Clyde gets closer and closer
to making love to her. And finally, toward the end of the film, the two actually make love,
a thrilling, boastful feat for Clyde. It is at this point that Clyde has made the final
transition from childlike innocence to toughened criminal.
This transition was not limited to Bonnie and Clyde, but extended to the whole
gang. C.W. started off in the film as a simple gas station attendant, but was encouraged by
the two to join them. His simple, childlike mistake of parking the car during the first
robbery further shows this initial innocence, but later in the film he is seen shooting at
several police officers. Blanche starts off as a shy woman, and makes the foolish mistake
of screaming during the first shootout, but grows hardened like the rest, as seen through
her asking for her share of the bank loot.
The couple’s eventual bloody last scene is a fitting fate for the two. Throughout
the film we see them shoot at least a dozen police officers. As they are riddled with
bullets in this final scene, it is as if in that moment, every bullet they had shot through
their escapades returned to kill them. The scene itself could be perhaps viewed as anti
climatic and disappointing for the audience. Here we are, after watching the couple
escape from hundreds of bullets and a variety of chases, staring in silence at the bullet
riddled lifeless bodies of Bonnie and Clyde. It seems almost unreal that it could happen
this way, we think, that they should “give up” so easily. The silence of the moment serves
to imply that all was for naught. Going back to the first scene of the film, where Bonnie is
staring with boredom through the bars in her bed, we see that this is the ending that she
would have wanted. For at the beginning of the film, she desired escape from the small
town boredom of her life, and rather than be caught and going to prison, through her
death, was set free.