"But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It":

Bonnie and Clyde and the Sexual Revolution

Jana Kay Lunstad

Narratives of the gangster film genre have consistently centered on the story of
the male members of the Mafia family who attain their goals of wealth, power,
and providing for their families, through criminal and violent acts. While critics
such as Thomas Ferraro, William Simon, and Stella Bruzzi have focused on
various aspects of the gangster story, such as patriarchal structure, ethnic and
minority portrayals, family relationships, and even clothing styles, the role of
women in gangster films has been a largely neglected subject.' In this article I
argue for the centrality of female characters in understanding the ideological and
formal workings of the gangster genre.2This remedies an oversight in genre film
criticism, as well as adds substantially to feminist investigations of female
figurability and visibility.
The traditional gangster narrative follows the progress of one male
individual as he strives to fulfil1 the expectations placed on him by a patriarchal
society. The gangster's central preoccupation of living out the American dream
of economic success and power in a capitalist system, and his passionate drive to
prevail, put him at odds with society's efforts to maintain social order. Because
this familiar plot line focuses on the male characters, the women in the films are
generally seen as narrative constructs who simply move the story along. As
Laura Mulvey in "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema," suggests:

Woman ... stands in patriarchal culture as a signifier for the male other,
bound by a symbolic order in which man can live out his fantasies and
obsessions through linguistic command by imposing them on the silent
image of woman still tied to her place as bearer, not maker of meaning.3

The image of the matronly wife in a plain black dress serving spaghetti and
upholding traditional family values, or the pampered mistress who spends the
gangster's money and draws attention to his sexual prowess and power,
illustrates this concept of woman as a cultural signifier. Seen as silent and
passive characters, whose meaning is dependent on the male characters, these
women become as predictable in the films as the familiar iconography of the
gangster's black suit and gattling gun. As long as the female characters act in
accordance with the rules imposed by the dominant males they are allowed to
8 Left History 6.1

continue to occupy their prescribed space, but any aberration or failure to

negotiate the spheres of wife or mistress leads to isolation and destruction.
Because audiences have come to expect these women to function as mere
narrative devices, mediating the gangster's goal of rising to power and his means
of doing so, the complexity of female characters has long been overlooked.
Although these women seem to move around in the background and periphery
of the narratives, they in fact exist beyond the formal aspects of the film genre
and deserve to be foregrounded. A close reading of these characters will show
how the women act as an index for marking the evolution of the genre. This can
be achieved by examining how these characters fit in to, reflect, and mediate the
political and cultural context of the period in which the films were made;
changes in the genre may be identified by analyzing why and how women were
depicted in different ways at different historicaljunctures.
The 1960s was a critical decade in this history, during which national
attention focused on women and the women's movement. As women fought to
assert their right to equality in the workplace, the government, and the bedroom,
society's notions of femininity, masculinity, and appropriate gender roles began
to shift. The media played a central role in how people perceived the women's
movement and the sexual revolution, and Hollywood genre films were no
exception. In the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde, director Arthur Penn examines
issues such as women's struggle to discover a voice, male and female sexuality,
criminality, and masculinity. In doing so, he rewrites the stories of the historical
outlaws Bonnie and Clyde and manipulates the gangster genre, and specifically
the sub-genre of the rural bandit film. In order to understand how Penn utilizes
the genre to recreate historical characters into sixties icons, it is necessary to
understand the gangster genre's development.
The history of the genre reaches back several decades and Jack Ellis
explains that film genres emerged from Hollywood's studio era of the 1930s
"because of the requirements of mass productions and popular a ~ p e a l . " ~
Although genres came about because of the vertical control that studios
maintained over all stages of production, distribution, and exhibition, and
therefore the requirements of product differentiation, they retained their
popularity even after the breakdown of the original studio system. The
audience's familiarity with conventional story lines and standard iconographic
images typical to westerns, musicals, horror films, or gangster films allows
directors and screenwriters to utilize a genre to express contemporary cultural
concerns. It seems that the story lines would become trite as they are repeated,
but Thomas Schatz reminds us that,
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 9

with repeated viewing .. . the genre's narrative pattern comes into focus
and the viewer's expectations take shape. And when we consider that the
generic pattern involves not only narrative elements (character, plot,
setting) but thematic issues as well, the genre's socializing influence
becomes more a~parent.~

In other words, while the formal elements of a genre are repeated, the ideological
content of every genre film changes according to the time in which the film was
made and thus mediates the audience's cultural beliefs and concerns. Because of
a genre's ability to adapt in order to reflect contemporary cultural interests, it
serves as an excellent tool to chart not only the formal evolution of films but also
as a means to understand shifts in ideological thought. As Andrew Tudor
suggests, "The crucial factors which distinguish a genre are not only
characteristics inherent to the films themselves; they also depend on the
particular culture within which we are ~perating."~
A genre's connection to culture was an all-important factor in the rise and
fall of the gangster film. Gangster films gained popularity with the three
monumental films Little Caesar (1930), The Public Enemy (1931), and
Scarface, Shame of the Nation (1932).7 One of the draws of the genres was the
new sound and editing techniques that allowed filmmakers to depict the violence
more realistically: the sounds of screeching tires and automatic weapons being
fired from fast-moving vehicles turned the gangster film into a visual spectacle.
This new film technology only added to the gangster's show of glamour and
wealth that initially attracted Depression era audiences in need of escapism. As
filmmakers presented the gangsters' lifestyle, a series of visual patterns, or
icons, emerged that allowed audiences to immediatily recognize the genre.
Unlike the ever-changing ideology reflected in movies, the iconography of
the gangster film has stayed relatively the same over the genre's sixty-year life
span. Robert Warshow argues that while films do mediate history, aesthetically
they refer to each other:

Moreover, the relationship between the conventions which go to make up

such a type and the real experience of its audience or the real facts of
whatever situation it pretends to describe is only of secondary importance
and does not determine its aesthetic force. It is only in an ultimate sense
that the type appeals to previous experience of the type itself: it creates its
own field of referen~e.~

This idea of films referring back to each other, rather than to history,
10 Left History 6.1

appears in several different films over a number of years. For example, Tony in
Little Caesar is shot by fellow gang members while walking up the steps of the
church to confess to his priest. After the shots ring out, TonyS body falls across
the steps. This scene is echoed in The Godfather I when, while Michael is
becoming godfather to Connie's baby, rival Mafia members are being e x e ~ u t e d . ~
Two men are walking down steps that recall the church steps in Little Caesar,
and when they are killed their bodies fall in the same manner. Another useful
example is found in the 1983 version of Scarface staring AI Pacino.lOThemovie
is a remake of the 1932 Scarface, but Pacino's character's name is Tony
Montana, which is a combination of Tony Camonte from the original film and
the Mafia chieftain Pete Montana from Little Caesar. Another more recent
example of self-reference can be found in Get Shorty (1995).11Alex Rocco, who
plays MO Green, a character who is shot in the face while getting a massage in
The Godfather I, shows up in this current film. His character, Buddy, in a scene
that mirrors The Godfather I, lies on his stomach getting a massage. But instead
of getting killed, he explains to another wise guy that he cannot kill a "made
man." This kind of self-referentiality creates an aesthetic dialogue within each
genre, foregrounding questions of revision and homage.
An examination of how the gangster genre refers to itself thematically and
visually in the portrayal of the female characters illuminates how the genre has
evolved over the years. Critics have focused on how women function formally in
the films by how they support the leading male characters, but little attention has
been paid to how the repeated formal use of these characters has affected the
genre itself. For example, in "The Thematic Paradigm," Robert Bray suggests
that throughout the history of American cinema, characters and plots
consistently revolve around binary oppositions. In his analysis of the
outlaw/hero relationships he argues:

Women were avoided as representing the very entanglements that

tradition sought to escape: society, the "settled life,'' confining
responsibilities. The outlaw hero sought only uncompromising
relationships, involving either a 'bad' women (whose morals deprived her
of all right to entangling domesticity) or other males (who themselves
remain independent). Even the 'bad' woman posed a threat since mamage
often uncovered the clinging 'good' girl underneath. Typically therefore,
American stories avoided this problem by killing off the 'bad' woman
before the marriage could transpire. Subsequently, within the all-male
group, women became taboo except as objects of lust.I2
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 11

While Bray's argument does cover a broad expanse of American outlaw

films, he neglects the genre of the American gangster film in which the good
girlhad girl dichotomy does not exist to threaten the gangster's independence,
but rather provides the impetus behind his criminal lifestyle. The gangster's
main motivation seems to be one of material advancement, but the men in this
genre consistently insist that their desire to protect and provide for their family
- both their Mafia family as well as their wives, children, and mistresses -
necessitates their acts of violence. For example, when an attempt is made on
Michael Corleone's life in The Godfather 11, he is not just concerned because
someone tried to assassinate him, he is enraged because the gunshots were fired
into his bedroom: "Where [his] wife sleeps. Where [his] children come and play
with their toys."" Likewise, Santino Corleone swears vengeance on his brother-
in-law Carlos in The Godfather I because he beat up his sister Connie; and Tony
"Scarface" Camonte kills his partner Little Boy only when he thinks Little Boy
has taken advantage of his sister Francesca.
Both classic gangster films and later gangster films provide fertile ground to
discuss female characterization, but I would like to focus on the ruralhandit
sub-genre that emerged after the decline of the classic films. Shortly after the
early films came out, their popularity attracted the attention of groups such the
Catholic Church based Legion of Decency, and studios soon came under attack
for not adhering to moral guidelines set forth in the Production Codes. These
Codes were designed to limit what Hollywood could film and to protect
audiences'"mora1 standards."I4 The enforcement of the Production Codes in the
thirties changed the focus of the gangster genre from the fierce gangster who
attacks society to the diligent and single-minded law enforcer who attacked
criminals. According to Schatz, this shift caused the gangster genre to go "into a
period of diffusion and decline . .. and only occasionally was it able to recapture
the visual style, characterization, and narrative complexity of the classic
gangster ~agas."'~
One type of film that came to replace the watered-down versions of the
gangster narrative was the bandit film that emerged in the forties.I6 Instead of
depicting a hero at odds with his urban environment, these films portrayed
"heroes of tragic proportion who reevaluated their past misdeeds but realized the
inevitability of their fate .... Such an ambivalent portrait of the hero and his
changing values is a great deal more complex morally and socially than that of
the late-30s bandit precursors."17 Unlike the traditional gangster who truly
believes that he will beat the system and get away with criminal behavior simply
because he has the ambition to do so, the bandit hero self-consciously questions
the role that he plays in society and understands the consequences of his criminal
12 Left History 6.1

actions. This self-awareness is the key difference between the bandit films and
the classic gangster films, and because of it the rural outlaw developed into the
perfect character to criticize social mores and conventions.
If the ruralhandit character was ideal character to question issues of
authority, then Arthur Penn was the ideal director to utilize the genre's potential.
Early in his career as a filmmaker he discussed his theories about, and
motivations behind, movie making by stating:

I would say that the only people who really interest me are the outcasts
from society. The people who are not outcasts -either psychologically,
emotionally, or physically - seem to me a good material for selling
breakfast food, but they're not material for films. What I'm really trying to
say through the figure of the outcast is that a society has its mirror in its
outcasts. A society would be wise to pay attention to the people who do
not belong if it wants to find out what its configuration is and where it's
failing.I8

Penn self-consciously employs characters who do not fit into mainstream

society and in the process he manipulates generic mediums.19 Perhaps the best
example of his directorial approach is found in Bonnie and Clyde (1967), in
which he reinvents the bandit film, and in doing so, critiques gender i d e o l ~ g i e s . ~ ~
Robert Benton, who wrote the screenplay with David Newman, recognized that
the film needed an American director and that Penn's work on the film was
crucial to its ~uccess.~' As screenwriters they were "concerned with the
mythology [of Bonnie and Clyde]," but as the director Penn was "concerned
with the social context and ~ommentary."~~ So, while the film is based on
historical facts, it also plays around with those facts in order to address
contemporary issues. Penn made this point clear when, before filming had
begun, the studio decided to that in order to stay true to the historical period of
the subjects the film would be shot in black and white. He explains that both he
and Warren Beatty (who both starred in and produced the film) refused:
"Absolutely not. It's got to be a film about now. This is not a re-creation of
Bonnie and Clyde, they were a couple of thugs. We're talking about two kind of
paradigmatic figures for our Because Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow
were outlaws and outcasts from society, and because Penn admitted that his goal
was to question the social order that existed in his own generation, it is
appropriate to argue that Penn uses the story of Bonnie and Clyde, the
Depression era outlaws, to reflect the cultural attitudes of the sixties. In order to
understand how the characters of Bonnie and Clyde hnction as a reflection and
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 13

criticism of the sixties culture, I will analyze historical accounts of Bonnie

Parker as well as information concerning the women's movement. A comparison
of the original story to the modifications or embellishments that Penn made in
the movie will bring to light issues critical to the women's movement, especially
the sexual revolution that was under way in the sixties.24
Early in the sixties, the government of the United States started to become
more actively aware of women's issues. In 1961 President John F. Kennedy,
following recommendations of Assistant Secretary of Labor Esther Peterson,
"established a commission on the status of women to create a plan to help
women fill their dual public and private roles." As a direct result of this
commission, Congress passed legislation in 1963 "prohibiting differentials by
sex in wage rates in private industry," which was "the first such employment
discrimination law."2s While women's issues were being recognized on a federal
level, they were also being addressed on a social level, and various individual
women formed independent groups to continue the discussion surrounding
gender concerns. In this same year Betty Friedan published her ground-breaking
book Feminine Mystique. Friedan claims that she wrote the book in order to
bring women's rights to the "national consciousness and personal
consciousness." She goes on to add that:

[Women] were in the era when there was only one image of woman:
woman defined only in sexual relation to men - men's wife, mother,
housewife, sex object, server of physical needs to husband, children,
home. This was absolutely so prevailing that each woman thought there
was something wrong with her .... My book, and others that followed it,
broke through that obsolete definition of women that was limiting their
vision of their own possibilities and necessities to move in society as a
whole.26

Friedan, and other women committed to these same goals, went on to form the
National Organization of Women in 1966.
NOW was not the only organization that worked to advance women's rights.
Alice Echols explains that the Civil Rights Movement was a large factor that
figured into the women's rights movement because while women worked with
blacks to abolish racist laws for organizations such as the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and Students for a Democratic Society
(SDS), they began to question their participati~n.~'A majority of them were
given stereotypical women's work, such as cooking and secretarial jobs, while
the men were doing fieldwork in leadership positions. But, as movement
14 Left History 6.1

activist and sociologist Wini Breines explains:

It is impossible not to be aware of how shaped we were by the Civil Rights

movement ... and how crucial our participation was. I wondered at the
time how it could be that women were subordinate in those movements
and yet often were not clearly conscious of it. For a time, it seems, the
excitement of our own activism and ruptures with our pasts, the new
experiences of feeling strong and purposeful overwhelmed the
recognition of sexism.28

As women became aware of their desire to contribute more to SNCC and SDS,
they also began to recognize their need to actively promote women's rights and
they began to borrow from the groups' theory to form their own organizations to
discuss political and social reform for women. One of the tenets that women
based much of their work on was that a group "must organize around their own
oppre~sion."~~
As women began to feel more socially empowered, they also became more
comfortable with their sexuality and wanted to extend the limits of what society
felt was appropriate for women. Women were able to question their sexual roles
not only because they were gaining more social and political power, but also
because they were securing more control over their bodies. Women were able to
meet this goal after Gregory Pincus successfully developed the birth control pill
in the late fifties. By 1966, six million American women and another six million
around the world were taking the pill. Obviously, birth control allowed women
to take more control of their bodies and they could experiment with sex without
worrying about pregnancy. Women, such as Ambassador Clare Booth Luce,
openly praised the pill and said of it, "Modern woman is at last free as a man is
free, to dispose of her own body, to earn her living, to pursue the improvement
of her mind, to try a successful career."30
While this new found sexual freedom was generally seen as a large step
forward for the women's movement, it also spawned conflicting opinions among
individual women. Some, like the author of Personal Politics, Sara Evans, felt
that men expected women to adopt their "own more promiscuous sexual
standards," and that women were exploited rather than liberated by the sexual
revol~tion.~' Others, such as Deidre English, pointed out that those who
dismissed the sexual revolution as an event that exploited women did not
recognize the opportunities it could provide them. She says:
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 15

My recollection of it is that it was not an unmitigated disaster. The sexism

was there, but women were actually having more sexual experience of
different kinds and enjoying it. Women were having sex that was not
procreational, and claiming the right to it as well as paying a lower social
and emotional cost.32

Echols points out that as women debated back and forth about sex, men also
questioned their new role as the revolution gained momentum; would they have
to become less sexual as women became more The questions that both
men and women posed about women's sexuality and changing gender roles in
the sixties are addressed in Bonnie and Clyde.
The use of historical figures to question contemporary gender issues
presents itself in the opening sequence of Bonnie and Clyde with the editing
together of several snapshots. These photographs depict people in the
Depression era, with the images gradually shifting from old people, to younger
people, to pictures and short biographies of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow.
The contrast between these images oftraditional and rural life, and the next shot
-an extreme close-up of Bonnie's lips while she puts on lipstick -emphasizes
the generation gap that existed in the sixties. Penn himself describes this opening
sequence as "a close-up of her hungry lips ... that's what it is - a hunger for
something more than her present e ~ i s t e n c e . "Bonnie's
~~ dissatisfaction with her
situation is further emphasized as the camera draws back from Bonnie's lips and
we are given first a view of her face, and then her naked body. She demonstrates
her boredom and frustration with the domestic sphere as she moves from the
mirror and throws herself on her bed. Her act of beating on the bars of the bed
and then grasping them to pull her face up between them suggests that she feels
imprisoned by her present situation of living at home and working as a
waitress.35This is further emphasized when she stands in front of the window.
The focus shifts from an interior to exterior shot, and we see Bonnie encased by
the window, with the ledges covering her breasts and thighs. Her complete
enclosure in the window frame not only suggests that her captivity springs from
her leashed desire, but that she also is framed metatextually as an inconographic
representation of the sixties' liberated woman.
In Born to be Wild: Hollywood and the Sixties Generation, Seth Cagin and
Philip Dray point out that Faye Dunaway was required to lose thirty pounds in
order to play Bonnie in the film.36This careful attention to Bonnie's body pays
off. Her thinness and bony ribs not only draw attention to the fact that the story
is set in the Depression when people literally did not have enough money to eat,
but also to changing notions of the ideal female body that arose in the sixties
16 Left History 6.1

with women such as Twiggy, Jane Fonda, and Brigitte Bardot. While Dunaway
dazzles the audience as a sexual image, Bonnie's nudity, sexuality, and
autoeroticism dazzle Clyde. The last sequence of our introduction to Bonnie is
when she hurriedly pulls a dress out of her closet (the closet door has a picture of
a house on it), throws it on, and runs out to meet Clyde. Bonnie literally runs
away from home and the domestic sphere. The low angle camera shot from the
bottom of the stairs is not there to show us Bonnie's expression or feelings about
meeting this mysterious man who's trying to steal her mother's car. Rather, the
camera's voyeuristic gaze up Bonnie's dress as she races down stairs emphasizes
that it is Bonnie's sexuality and desire to escape from the life that her mother led
(as shown in the snapshots) that leads her into a life of crime with Clyde.
This interpretation becomes clearer when compared to the real story of
Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. E.R. Milner explains that Bonnie had married
when she was sixteen (she had a tattoo on her upper thigh that had her and her
husband's name in a heart) and her husband went to jail for robbery within a few
years of their wedding. In order to make ends meet Bonnie was employed as a
waitress in West Dallas, Texas, but when the cafe where she worked closed down
she agreed to she take a job caring for a neighbor who had broken an arm. It was
while she was in her friend's home that she met Clyde. They were instantly
attracted to each other and began corresponding. When Clyde went to jail,
Bonnie lied to her mother and left town to break him out by sneaking a stolen
gun into his cell. She met him when he got away from the prison, and at this point
they began their life of crime together.37Although this is certainly not the most
common way of meeting someone, Bonnie and Clyde's introduction, and the
beginning of their relationship, pales next to the erotic and exciting meeting
presented in the film. Penn admits that the opening of the film was completely
fabricated and states that "We made conjectures about their intimate life,
because we didn't know much about it .... But we do know that he was deeply
devoted to her."38 Penn openly admits basing a film around a subject about which
he did not have thoroughly documented information, and this demonstrates that
his agenda of questioning social order begins with his portrayal of Bonnie as a
sexual, liberated woman.
In From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies, Molly
Haskell argues that in sixties films, "There is only sexual liberation or
nonliberation, eithedor, nudity or full dress. And when [women were]
'liberated' on the screen -that is, exposed and made to be sexually responsive
to the males in the vicinity -it was in order to comply with male fantasies ... or
to confirm men's worst fears."39 In this context, Bonnie's nudity on screen would
not serve to question views about women's sexuality but would only perpetuate
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 17

the dominant culture's perception of women as solely sexual objects that should
gratify male desire. Clyde represents the male fear of overt female sexuality and
what his role should be. Although Haskell suggests that Bonnie's sexual
openness exists to satisfy the male gaze and audience, I would argue that her
sexuality also establishes a woman's need to satisfy herself, despite Clyde's fears
and society's disapproval. The image of her on the screen does not play into male
fantasies regarding the female body, but rather her presence as a fully sexual
woman, within the context of the women's movement, affirms women's rights to
exert sexual desire.
This idea is further substantiated in the next few minutes of the film during
which Bonnie becomes increasingly interested in Clyde's stories about prison.
She expresses her doubt about his claim that he served time an4 in what Nancy
Cott describes as "possibly the film's sexiest moment," Bonnie runs her tongue
over the top of a coke bottle while Clyde pulls out his gun.40The camera zooms
in for a close up as she fondles the weapon and sighs. Critics such as Robert
Toplin have focused on Clyde's impotency and suggest that Clyde's gun
represents his displaced sexuality, with the firing of the gun symbolizing
eja~ulation.~' While this interpretation is valid, it neglects to mention Bonnie's
response to Clyde's gun. She admires his weapon, and therefore his sexuality,
but she also taunts him by saying, "But you wouldn't have the gumption to use
it." Her tone suggests that not only she is very aware of her own sexual power and
longs to express it, but that she also doubts Clyde's ability to not only deal with
her sexuality, but also his own.
Bonnie's fascination with Clyde's dangerous lifestyle is what initially draws
her to him, but she soon realizes that she will have to embrace his criminality,
rather than his body, to find sexual gratification. Surprisingly, Clyde rejects
Bonnie's bold advances and informs her that he "is no good as a lover boy." He
bluntly informs her that she should have more respect for herself. While it is
obvious that Bonnie's resents his rejection, his offer to take her away from her
small town and dress her in silk, simply because she "may be the best damn girl
in Texas," appeals to her. Echol's point that men felt uncomfortable with the
sexual revolution is evident here - Clyde becomes less sexual as Bonnie
becomes more assertive. But despite Clyde's impotency, he still welcomes
Bonnie as an equal partner. They both take part in the crimes, and Bonnie's
desires are not ignored, but rather displaced on to their violent acts.
Bonnie knows that Clyde is impotent and afraid of initiating a sexual union,
but she never gives up trying to engage in sexual activity. After Clyde kills a
man, in a bumbled bank robbery, he gives her a choice about either going home
to her mother or staying with him;she refuses to leave him and he rewards her
18 Left History 6.1

loyalty with a display of physical affection. Clyde backs off after only a few
kisses, but Bonnie continues to attempt to make love to him and even initiates
oral sex. Clyde's uneasiness with Bonnie's advances is highlighted by the lack of
extradiegetic sound. The only noise we hear is natural sound, such as the
creaking of the bed as they shift positions and their breathing, and this lack of a
musical soundtrack stresses Bonnie's passion and Clyde's lack of desire. Clyde
finally stops her advances and instead of the male gaze being satisfied, there is a
sense of relief for the audience. His voice reiterating that he isn't much of a lover
boy breaks the silence, and we are rescued, for a moment, from witnessing this
palpable sexual tension. Bonnie's voracious sexuality does not serve to gratify
the male audience, but rather exists to illustrate the sexual tension raised by
candid female desire. Because this issue cannot be resolved in the bedroom, it is
instead worked out in their robberies.
Newton and Benton claim that they purposehlly created characters who
would appeal to the youth culture of the sixties. After the film was made they
asserted:

If Bonnie and Clyde were here today, they would be hip. Their values have
been assimilated in much of our culture -not robbing banks and killing
people of course, but their style, their sexuality, their bravado, their
delicacy, their cultivated arrogance, their narcissistic insecurity, their
curious ambition have relevance to the way we live now.42

If Bonnie and Clyde represent the attitude of the youth, then there is no
question that Sheriff Frank Hamer symbolizes the older generation. He signifies
society's fear of not only youth questioning social authority, but also its
uneasiness about a sexually independent woman. Milner points out that in fact
the real Hamer never met Bonnie and Clyde and actually had to have another law
officer confirm their identities at the ambush sight.43Penn's decision to create a
scene in which Hamer meets the outlaws signifies the importance of how the
social outcast questions the establishment. When Hamer first meets the Barrow
Gang, he attempts to sneak up on them from behind their car. Clyde spots him
and shoots his gun out of his hand. After Clyde berates him for not doing his job
-"protecting poor folk" -the group argues about what to do with him. Buck
suggests shooting him while C.W. Moss thinks they should hang him, but it is
Bonnie who comes up with the solution: "Let's take his picture." Bonnie's
decision to humiliate him, by not only having her picture taken with him, but
also by running the tip of her gun over his mustache and then kissing him full on
the mouth, rejects the cultural attitude that women should restrain their sexual
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 19

appetites. Hamer does not show any emotion throughout the whole scene, until
after Bonnie kisses him when he spits in her face. His disgust for, and
disapproval of, the Barrow Gang's law breaking is insignificant compared to his
contempt for Bonnie's open sexuality. Another character who reflects this same
opinion is Malcolm Moss. He is cordial and welcoming to Bonnie and Clyde but
when alone with his son C.W., he declares his loathing of the couple, and
particularly Bonnie. He says, "What does Bonnie know, she ain't nothin' but
cheap trash herself." Malcolm despises Bonnie for getting his son involved with
crime, and his dislike for her motivates him to conspire with Hamer. Malcolm
not only wants to protect C.W., he also wants Bonnie disciplined for her active
participation in their criminal lifestyle.+'
While Hamer and Malcolm dislike Bonnie, Bonnie's mother loves her
daughter but realizes that others do disapprove of her career choice and will not
allow her to continue to threaten mainstream society. Clyde tells Mrs. Parker that
Bonnie told him that after they quit running from the law she "couldn't bear to
live more than three miles away from [her] precious mother." When Clyde asks
Mrs. Parker if she would enjoy having Bonnie live near her, she replies, "I don't
believe I would. I surely don't. You try to live three miles from me and you ain't
gonna live long, honey. You best keep running ... and you know it." For Bonnie,
sexuality and criminality are synonymous, and society will not let a
criminal/sexual woman settle down in a community, and her mother, a member
of the older generation, knows this and warns her.
As James Lynn points out: "The average cinematic construction of the
feminine is an effect of male-orchestrated signs, code, and conventions that have
established themselves in the perception of male and female audiences as
normal."45 So, even though Bonnie mediates the progressive gender ideologies
of the sixties, she also is presented in the traditional mode of filmmaking and
must comply with the formal structure of the gangster genre. The focus of the
genre's narrative is on the male individual, so the female character has to draw
attention to his struggle. Despite his sexual impotency, Clyde's devotion to
Bonnie and his desire to protect her are paramount to the story line. He informs
Bonnie's mother that he has purposefully passed up jobs that would have been
lucrative because they posed a threat to Bonnie's safety, when he says, "I ain't
gonna risk my little girl here just to make money, uncertain as times are," and
when Bonnie runs away from him he panics. These tender moments between the
couple are juxtaposed with the criminal scenes where Clyde's violent and
dangerous nature comes out. As the tale progresses we see less and less of this
side of Clyde as the focus of the film shifts to their relationship. Schatz argues
that unlike the classic gangster genre, in the rural bandit story line, "the hero's
20 Left History 6.1

transition ... from hardened, cynical gangster to humane, sensitive lover taxes
the genre's demand of moral retrib~tion."~~ This shift in narrative locus
complicates the ending of the movie because once they have settled down for a
little while with the Moss family, after Buck has been killed and Blanche
blinded, their crimes are pushed to the background of the narrative and are
diminished in the audience's mind.
Instead of daring robbery scenes and fast get-a-ways, the end of the movie
is filled with scenes of Bonnie and Clyde having quiet, casual conversation.
Once Bonnie has accepted Clyde's impotency she turns to writing poetry for
further validation. This aspect of the character of Bonnie is in keeping with the
real Bonnie Parker. Dallas County Deputy Sheriff Ted Hinton, who first met
Bonnie in 1929 when she was a waitress, claims that when Bonnie was young
"she wanted to be a singer ... or maybe an actress or poet."47 Penn utilizes the
original Bonnie's dramatic flair and poetic ambition to represent how Bonnie,
the character, needs to express herself with words. This characterization mirrors
how real women strove to affirm their intellects and establish a "voice" or self-
representation. In the film Dunaway reads, "The Story of Bonnie and Clyde," or
as it is also known "It's Death," the actual poem that the real Bonnie composed
and sent to newspapers for p u b l i ~ a t i o nThe
. ~ ~ stylistics of the poem are simple
and Dunaway's slow, faltering recital of it only emphasizes its childlike qualities
and draws attention to her initial steps toward recognizing and asserting her own
significance in their narrative. We hear their story from her female perspective
and therefore have to acknowledge her vital role in their criminal activities and
in their rise to legendary status in American history.
The poem's form is elementary, but its function is complex. It establishes
Bonnie's narrative position, which is essential to the film's depiction of her as a
reflection of sixties gender politics, and it also llfills the expectations of the
genre because it refocuses the audience's attention to the protagonist. Clyde is
obviously delighted with her homage, and she shyly revels in his praise. The
personal importance that they place on the poem affirms Bonnie's first attempt at
establishing her voice, but this significance is down played because Clyde is only
able to recognize himself in work. He exclaims, "You know what you've done?
You told my story. I told you one day I'd make you somebody and that's what you
done for me. Made me someone that everybody will remember." The
importance of the poem should lie in Bonnie's authorial voice, but ultimately it
rests on the subject of Clyde.
Through his self-aggrandizement Clyde overcomes his fear of intimacy and
finally initiates sex. He moves in to kiss her and the camera ignores their
lovemaking. The audience is shut out of this encounter as the lens follows the
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 21

discarded newspaper, and poem, blowing away in the wind. Their union is now
normalized because it is finally Clyde who expresses desire rather than Bonnie.
Bonnie's sexual satisfaction, which was foregrounded in the beginning of the
film, takes a back seat to Clyde's empowerment and once their sexual desires
have been recognized, she no longer has the need to continue committing crimes
and running from the law. This point is accentuated when the extradiegetic
music that has always played during their criminal escapades begins; the
repetition of this music highlights the fact that for Bonnie, sex and crime have
existed in the same realm. The demands of the genre are met because Clyde
becomes the hero whose social power stems not only from his robberies and
killings, but also from his romantic and sexual command.
Despite the shift in their motivations, and the audience's new sympathy for
the doomed couple, Frank Hamertracks them down, determined to punish them.
By the end of the film it is apparent that Bonnie and Clyde's sexual
consummation has tamed Bonnie's sexual assertiveness, so the audience almost
forgets that this issue exists and has to be addressed in the closing scenes. But
Penn subtly reminds us when Bonnie fishes around in the back seat for a pear.
She takes a bite from the fruit and then carefilly feeds Clyde as they take their
last drive together down a dirt road in Arcadia, Louisiana. Immediately
following this Adam and Eve like scene, in which we are reminded that the root
of the film's tension lies in Bonnie's sexuality, Hamer and his men ambush
Bonnie and Clyde. The shot-reverse-shot sequence of extreme close-ups of
Bonnie and Clyde's eyes as they share the recognition that they are going to be
killed restates their close bond and equal partnership. The very last image of
Hamer, dressed in the traditional villains' black clothes, framed by the bullet-
ridden car window, reiterates that he punishes Bonnie and Clyde not only for
their criminal acts, but also for their lack of respect for authority, and for the
sexual humiliation he has suffered at their hands. Mainstream society's unease
with the phenomenon of Bonnie as a sexually uninhibited woman is presented
on how the "problem" of Bonnie Parker is dealt with. She is punished in the end
by the law not only because she was a criminal, but also because the social order
did not know how to deal with a woman who wanted to settle down and at the
same time acted on her sexual desires.
Society's harsh punishment for a woman like Bonnie becomes even more
evident with a comparison of her character to that of Blanche Barrow, the
minister's daughter who's married to Clyde's brother Buck. A blatant recognition
of the differences between the two women is especially evident when they meet
for the first time. Buck, who is overjoyed to be reunited with his brother, insists
that they take family pictures. When Clyde photographs the couple, Blanche
22 Left History 6.1

coyly giggles, worries over her appearance, and affects horror at the prospect of
being captured on film. Bonnie, on the other hand, gives Blanche a look of
disdain, grabs a gun, defiantly chomps on a cigar, and stands proudly in front of
their car. The pose she adopts replicates the photographs of the real Bonnie that
police developed from a roll of film the Barrow Gang left behind in Joplin. When
the photographs were published in the Fort Worth Star Telegram, with the
description of Bonnie as a cigar-smoking moll, Bonnie wrote a letter to the
editor asking them to retract the statement. In fact, she so adamantly despised
the unfeminine image that the press presented, that when a released hostage
asked Bonnie what she wanted him to tell the newspapers about her, she replied:
"Tell them I don't smoke cigars."49 Although Penn remains true to the poses
presented in the historical photographs, he notably disregards the concern that
the real Bonnie expressed about them. Instead, he plays up the tough, seductive
image of the gun-wielding woman in order to stress the sexual tension that
pervades the film. And he reinforces this notion of Bonnie asserting herself as a
promiscuous character by creating the scene in which Bonnie has Clyde take
pictures of her kissing Frank Hamer. Significantly, while Bonnie plays the
temptress, Blanche refuses to take part in the Hamer humiliation.
Blanche's compliance with mainstream society's gender expectations is not
only evident in her chaste and domestic demeanor, but is also unmistakable in
her embarrassment at seeing C.W. in his underwear, her enthusiasm for her
marital relationship, and her excitement about their rented apartment in Joplin.
The dichotomy between the two women is glaringly, and humorously,
highlighted when the law discovers the Barrow Gang's hideout and surrounds
them in Joplin -Bonnie escapes from their house with a gun, whereas Blanche
screams hysterically and runs away with an apron on and a spatula in hand.
Bonnie also smugly berates Blanche for her conservative domesticity and makes
fkn of her hillbilly ways.
Despite her refusal to participate in all of the gang's escapades, Blanche
does gradually develop a new attitude toward their unusual lifestyle. For
example, Blanche starts wearing pants an4 in an apparent nod to sixties'
fashion, she dons a pair of round, rose-colored sunglasses that Buck stole from
a bank security guard. She also demands a cut from their earnings because she
"risks her life just like everyone else and has to put up with sass from Miss
Bonnie Parker." So while Bonnie begins to depict a more moderate view of
femininity in order to adhere to the demands of the genre, Blanche begins to
accept her criminal situation and gradually reflects some of Ronnie's more
broad-minded attitudes.
This transition only draws more attention to the risks that a woman takes in
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 23

seeking acceptance from mainstream society while still adhering to

nontraditional gender roles. Luckily for Blanche, her unwillingness to
completely transform herself into an all-out criminal is noted by Hamer. The
authorities know that she does not fully participate in the gang's escapades, and
their knowledge influences how they choose to deal with her. After a shoot-out
in some tourist cabins, the gang finds themselves surrounded in a field. Buck and
Blanche are both injured and are not able to escape with Bonnie, Clyde, and
C.W. In spite of the fact that more men with more firepower take part in this
ambush than in the ambush in Joplin, Blanche survives. The police focus their
fire at Buck and kill him instantly, but they never even take aim at Blanche.
Blanche's filmic character has to live in order to remain true to actual historical
events, but Penn's careful attempt to point out the differences between Bonnie
and Blanche's compliance to accepted gender roles suggests that Blanche's
refusal to completely abandon society's expectations about gender roles saves
her from death, while Bonnie's aberration from accepted social mores leads
inevitably to her destruction.
While the ending of the film emphasizes the hazards of questioning gender
ideology, it also fills the formal demands of the genre. It is only after the
audience sympathizes with the protagonists, and the protagonists themselves
have recognized their fate, they are killed. This adherence to the medium
highlights the political subtleties of the film and also strengthens the socializing
influence of genre. As Tudor suggests, "the genre concept is indispensable in
more strictly social and psychological terms as a way of formulating the
interplay between culture, audiences, films and filmmaker^."^^ This interplay
between the film and the audience of film critics became a central point in the
success of Bonnie and Clyde. Initially critics expressed disgust with the film
because of the startling displays of violence, criminality, and sexuality, and
Pauline Kael, perhaps the earliest and staunchest supporter of the film, claims
that the "movie had been panned as an insult to the audience, as bloody and
offensive, by just about every major critic in the country." She goes on to add that
a positive review from The New Yorker came as "quite a shock to people,"
especially because the review was "coming from a ~ o m a n . " ~But ' the more
critics complained about the film, the more the public went to see it. Kael points
out that movie critics "tend to exalt works that we're emotionally and
intellectually ready for. And we expect the audience to be in the same spot in
their lives as we are .... The most a critic can do is to try to understand the
audience's responses -and maybe try to enlarge them a teeny bit."52 In the case
of Bonnieand Clyde, audiences were more prepared for the social messages, and
in an unprecedented move critics, such as Newsweek's Joe Mergenstern,
24 Lefi History 6.1

reversed their early negative review^.^'

One critic, who hated the film and did not change his opinion of the film as
it gained popularity, was Bosely Crowther from The New York Times. He not only
refused to hedge on his original opinion of the movie, but he also wrote more
than one review blasting it. One of his most immediate concerns was that

[Bonnie and Clyde] has Mr. Beatty clowning broadly as the killer who
fondles various types of guns with as much nonchalanceand dispassion as
he airily twirls a big cigar, and it has Miss Dunaway squirming grossly as
his thrill-seeking, sex starved

Even though Crowther criticizes both Beatty and Dunaway, the adjectives that
he uses to describe Dunaway are much more negative, which suggests that her
sexuality offends him more than Clyde's criminality. Penn admits that he was
"delighted" by Crowther's attacks because they not only provided much-need
publicity, but also because they proved that his own artistic intentions "were
misunderstood by people who should have rnisunder~tood."~~ The older
generation, or establishment, that Crowther represented were repulsed by the
message of overt sexuality and violence, while members of the younger
generations honed in on the social/sexual implications of the film.
This depiction of the two outlaws as rebellious youth was not the only
reason for the film's success. Another key factor in drawing young people to the
film was that advertisers purposefully marketed the film to that segment of the
population. Lobby cards for the film featured a sepia-toned picture of the
Barrow Gang as well as a short biography of them. It read:

Clyde was the leader. Bonnie wrote poehy. C.W. was a Myrna Loy fan
who had a bluebird tattooed on his chest. Buck told corny jokes and
carried a Kodak. Blanche was a preacher's daughter who kept her fingers
in her ears during the gunfights. They played checkers and photographed
each other incessantly. On Sundaynights they listened to Eddie Cantor on
the radio. All in all, they killed 18people. They were the shmgest damned
gang you ever heard of.

At first, this seems like it could be a description of any group of fun-loving

young people, until its casual mention of the gunfights and the number of
murders they committed. This technique appears in another poster that features
a black and white shot of Clyde driving a car. He has one hand on the steering
wheel and his other is wrapped around Bonnie. She is leaning into him with her
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 25

head thrown back and they both appear to be laughing. They look like any
normal, young happy couple except that we are looking at them through a bullet-
ridden car window. Above and below the image are the words: "They're young,
they're in love, and they kill people."56 Each of the advertisements explicitly
links youth, sex, and violence.
Advertisements influenced the perception of the film, and the stars in the
movie did as well. This was Faye Dunaway's big break into mainstream movies,
but Warren Beatty was already well known. The very fact that Beatty played the
role of Clyde draws attention to the sexual tension that pervades the film. He was
known as a lady's man who slept with all of his leading women and a man known
for sexual prowess playing an impotent character would obviously bring
attention to the leading actress who exudes sexual assertiveness. The
combination of youth and sexual responsiveness challenges the social order and
threatens to subvert gender ideology. As Pauline Kael points out:

Bonnie and Clyde brings into the almost frighteningly public world of
movies, things that people have been feeling and saying and writing
about. And once something is said or done on the screens of the world,
once it has entered mass art, it can never again belong to a minority, never
again be the private possession of an educated 'knowing' group. But even
for that group there is an excitement in hearing its own private thoughts
expressed out loud and in seeing somethingof its own sensibility become
part of our common culture.57

The people involved in the women's movement had to have recognized that
the issues and rights that they were fighting for werebeing addressed in the film,
and must have felt a sense of affirmation that what they were striving for was
possible. Although Bonnie is killed for acting out her sexuality, the issue was at
least being addressed in a public medium. Clyde's speech to Bomie, when he
convinces her to stay with him, addresses the issues of women's sexual and
intellectual capabilities:

All right, all right. If all you want's a stud service then you go on back to
West Dallas and you stay there the rest of your life.Youlre worth more than
that, a lot more than that, and you know it. And that's why you come along
with me. You can find a lover boy on any damn corner in town and it don't
make a damn to them whether you're waiting on table or picking cotton,
but it does make a damn to me! ... Because you're different ... you want
different things.Youwant something better than being a waitress.You and
26 Left History 6.1

me traveling together could cut a path clean across this state, and Kansas,
and Missouri, and Oklahoma!

Clyde's prediction is true. Not only do they create a sensation throughout

the Southwest with their criminal and violent acts, they also bring national
attention to the struggle that women face in claiming the right to express their
social and sexual desires. The portrayal o f the sexual woman in Bonnie and
Clyde in no way answered all the questions that the sexual revolution raised, but
the strength ofthe film lies in the fact that it addressed the complexities that both
men and women faced in negotiating issues of gender and sexuality. As Richard
Burton explains, "the outrage that greeted Penn's reinvention of the gangster
film may be difficult to grasp. Yet the calumny that was heaped upon Bonnie and
Clyde . . . helped to crystallize generational, political, and social conflicts that
went to the heart of the late Sixties' unprecedented cultural ~ p h e a v a l . " ~ ~

' Stella Bmzzi, "Style and the Hood," Sight and Sound, 5 (Nov. 95),26-7.; Thomas J.
Ferraro, "Blood in the Marketplace: The Business of Family in The Godfather
Narratives," in Werner Sollers, ed., The Invention of Ethnicity (New York 1989), 176-
208.; William Simon, "An Analysis of the Structure of The Godfather, Part I," Studies
in the Literary Imagination, 16.1 (Spring 1983), 75-89.
The formal and ideological roles are not, of course, mutually exclusive, but I am
using the term "ideological" heuristically. Wtile the formal role of the female
characters is grounded in the ideology of the thirties, the public discourses surrounding
gender throughout its life span influences the ideological shifts in female
characterization.
Laura Mulvey, "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" in Robyn R. Warhol and
Diane Price Herndl, eds., Feminisms: An Anthology of Literary Theory and Criticism,
(New Brunswick, N.J. 1993), 433.
Jack Ellis, The History of Film (Boston 1990), 156.
Thomas Schatz, Hollywood Genres (New York 198l), 1 1.
Andrew Tudor, "Genre and Critical Methodology," in Bill Nichols, ed., Movies and
Methods (Berkeley 1976), 122.
' Little Caesar, Mervin LeRoy (dir.), Edward G. Robinson, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.
@erf.), (Warner Bros., 1930); Scarface, Shame of the Nation, Howard Hawks (dir.),
Paul Muni, George Raft, Ann Dvorak @erf.), (United Artists, 1932).; The Public
Enemy, William A. Wellman (dir.), James Cagney, Jean Harlow, Edward Woods (perf.),
(Warner Bros., 193I).
Cited in Pam Cook, The Cinema Book (London 1994), 61.
The Godfather I, Francis Ford Coppola (dir.), Marlon Brando, AI Pacino, Robert
Duvall, Diane Keaton (perf.), (Paramount Pictures, 1972).
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption t o Use It" 27

l0 Scarface, Brian De Palma (dir.), AI Pacino, Steven Bauer, Michelle Pfeiffer (perf.),
(Universal Pictures, 1983).
l1 Get Shorw, Barry Sonnenfeld (dir.), John Travolta, Gene Hackman, Rene Russ,
Danny DeVito (perf.), (MGM, 1995).
l* Robert Bray, "The Thematic Paradigm," in Sona Maasik and Jack Solomon, eds.,
Signs of Life in the USA.: Readings on Popular Culture for Writers (Boston 1994),
243.
l3 The Godfather II, Francjs Ford Coppola (dir.), AI Pacino, Robert De Niro, Robert
Duvall, Diane Keaton (perf.), (Paramount Pictures, 1974).
l4 Schatz, Hollywood Genres, 95-98.
Is Ibid., 99.
l6 Some well-known films that portray the shift in the portrayal of gangsters include:
Angels with Dirty Faces, Michael Curitz (dir.), James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, Humphrey
Bogart (perf.), (First Nations Pictures, Inc., 1938).; Key Largo, John Huston (dir.),
Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, Lauren Bacall (perf.), (Warner Bros., 1948);
and White Heat, Raoul Walsh (dir.), James Cagney, Virginia Mayo, Edmond O'Brien
(perf.), (Warner Bros., 1949).
l7 Schatz, Hollywood Genres, 103.
l8 Cited in John Wakeman, ed., World Film Directors, 2 vols. (New York 1945, 1985),
769.
l9 For example, in The Left-Handed Gun (1957) Penn subverts notions of masculinity
in his Freudian reinterpretation of Billy the Kid, and in Little Big Man (1970) he offers
a rendering of Western American history which depicts the inherent racism of the
expansionist movement.
'O Bonnie and Clyde, Arthur Penn (dir.), Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Gene
Hackman, Estelle Parsons (perf.), (Warner Bros., 1967).
2' Christian Kealthy, "Robert Benton," in Film Comment, 3 1.1 (Jan./Feb., 1995). In
this interview Benton also explains that after reading a book about John Dillenger, and
watching Gun Crazy (1950), Breathless (1959), The 400 Blows (1959), and Shoot the
Piano Player (1960) he and Newman were inspired to write an "American New Wave
movie about Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow.'' ~herefGre,an American director was
essential.
22 Gary Crowdus and Richard Porton, "The Importance of a Singular, Guiding Vision:
An Interview with Arthur Penn," in Cineaste, 20.2 (1 994).
23 Cited in Crowdus and Porton, "An Interview."
24 Other films based on the legendary couple, such as The Bonnie Parker Story (1958),

also present Bonnie as a sexually voracious character. In fact, any account of the
Barrow Gang would naturally offer this representation because the real Bonnie Parker
was known for her sexual promiscuity. What makes Penn's film stand out is his admitted
attempt to use the legendary couple to specifically address the politics of the sixties.
25 Cynthia Hamson, "From Home to the House: The Changing Role of Women in
American Society," in US. Sociery and Values (Washington 1997).
26 Cited In Jennifer Chapin Harris, "After the Mystique is Gone: A Phone Interview
with Betty Friedan, March 19, 1997," in OffOur Backs, (Oct. 97).
27
Alice Echols, Daring to be Bad: Radical Feminism in America 1967-1975 (New
York 1989). Wini Breines claims that Echols's book is the "only full-length history of
the radical feminist movement."
28 Left History 6.1

28 Wini Breines, "Sixties Stones' Silences: White Feminism, Black Feminism, Black
Power," in NWSA Journal, 8 (Fall 1996).
29 Echols, Daring to be Bad, 41.
30 John Heiderny, What Wild Ecstasy: The Rise and Fall ofthe Sexual Revolution,
(New York 1997), 3 1.
Cited in Echols, Daring to be Bad, 42.
32 Cited in Ibid., 43.
33 Ibid., 44.
34 Cited in Crowdus and Porton, "An Interview."
35 This scene not only addresses issues of sexuality, it also raises questions about
women's economic status in the sixties. Bonnie is clearly unhappy about her financial
situation and this is a theme that the film returns to, but this topic is beyond the scope
of this article.
Seth Cagin and Phillip Dray, Born to be Wild: Hollywood and the Sixties Generation
(Boca Raton 1994), 13.
37 E.R. Milner, The Lives and Times of Bonnie and Clyde (Carbondale, Ill. 1996), 16-
22.
38 David Zinman, 50 Grand Movies of the 1960s and 1970s (New York 1986), 2 11 .
39 MoHy Haskell, From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies
(New York 1974), 340. Haskell has been recognized as the definitive critic in feminist
and film studies.
40 Nancy E Cott, "Bonnie and Clyde," in Mark C. Cames, ed., Past Imperfect: History
According to the Movies (New York 1996), 220.
4' Robert Brent Toplin, History by Hollywood: The Use and Abuse of the American
Past (Chicago 1966), 147.
42 Cited in Lawrence L. Murray, "Hollywood, Nihilism, and the Youth Culture of the
Sixties: Bonnie and Clyde (1967)," in John E. O'Connor and Martin A. Jackson, eds.,
American History/American Film: Interpreting the. Hollywood Image (New York 1979),
237-256.
43 Milner, Lives and Times of Bonnie and Clyde, 142.
44 An interesting aspect of the scene between Malcolm and C.W., is that it humorously

depicts the generation gap as it existed in the sixties. They argue about C.W.'s new tattoo
- C.W. defends his right to get a tattoo because Bonnie likes it and Malcolm suggests
that if C.W.'s mother could see him, she'd basically role over in her grave. The dialogue
is timeless and we could easily imagine their argument taking place in any home where
a teenage son is trying to impress a girl and the father is concerned about family image.
45 James Lynn, "Introduction," in Janet Todd, ed., Feminist Film Theory: The Problem

of Women in Film (New York 1988), 10.

46 Schatz, Hollywood Genres, 103.
47
John Neal Phillips and Andre L. Gorzell, "'Tell Them I Don't Smoke Cigars": The
Story of Bonny Parker,' in Francis Edward Abernethy (ed.), Legendery Ladies of Texas
(Dallas 1981), 164.
48 Ernest M. Raub, "Bonnie and Clyde: Their Lives and Their Victims," in The
Missouri State Trooper Magazine, n.d., <http://www.mosta.org/magazine.htm>. "It's
Death" is not the only poem that Bonnie wrote and sent out for publication and
publicity. She also wrote "Suicide Sal," a poem with a similar theme and style, and the
 "But You Wouldn't Have the Gumption to Use It" 29

press appropriated the title as a nickname for her.

49 Phillips and Gorzell, 168, 172-3.
Tudor, "Genre and Critical Methodology," 123.
Cited in Will Brantley, ed., Conversations with Pauline Kael (Jackson, Miss. 1996),
155-6.
Cited in "A Century of Moves: A Talk with Pauline Kael," Newsweek, (6 June
1998).
53 Christian Kealthy, "Robert Benton."
s4 Bosley Crowther, 77te New York Times Film Reviav, 1913-1968 (New York 1970),
3693.
Cited in Crowdus and Porton, "An Interview."
s6 Tim Dirks, "Bonnie and Clyde (1967);' in Greatest Films, n.d.,
<http://filmsite.ord>. This website contains an extensive review of the film as well as
pictures of several Bonnie and Clyde movie posters.
Pauline Kael, Kiss, Kiss, Bang. Bang, (Boston 1968), 47.
58
Crowdus and Porton, "An Interview."