8.1 | / 10 |
Users | 3.3 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 3.6 |
Bored waitress Bonnie Parker falls in love with an ex-con named Clyde Barrow and together they start a violent crime spree through the country, stealing cars and robbing banks.
Starring: Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, Estelle ParsonsDrama | 100% |
Period | 33% |
Romance | 23% |
Biography | 20% |
Crime | 17% |
Heist | 9% |
Video codec: VC-1
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: Dolby Digital Mono (192 kbps)
English, English SDH, French, Spanish, Korean
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 3.0 | |
Extras | 3.5 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Think of Sam Peckinpah’s The Getaway, Terrance Malick’s Badlands, Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers, and even David Lynch’s Wild at Heart—each has a common antecedent in Bonnie and Clyde, the controversial 1967 crime caper that officially ushered in the era of New Hollywood with its unflinching violence and nonchalant frankness about sexuality. And as the archetypal “two lovers on the lam” story, it has a little bit of everything. It’s a game- changing mash-up of slapstick comedy and bullet-riddled corpses, an anti-authoritarian romp and an ode to naiveté, a take-the-money-and-run thriller and a languid Sunday drive through the American South of the Dust Bowl and Depression. Essentially, it’s a road movie that presents love as a literal and figurative journey, fraught with abstract emotional obstacles as well as extremely tangible police barricades. It’s a bloody farce, an impotent romance with bisexual overtones, a steal-from- the-rich hootenanny. Hollywood would never be the same.
Target practice with Bonnie and Clyde...
This is the same disc that Warner Bros released back in March of 2008, with the same 1080p/VC- 1 encode, but since the studio did such an excellent job the first time around, no remastering is required. Bonnie and Clyde has been lovingly restored with minimal tweaking and filtering, and brought to Blu-ray with excellent-for-its-age clarity. Sure, when compared to more modern productions, the image is softer and less resolute, but this high-definition transfer presents a tremendous upgrade from previous DVD releases of the film, with finer detail and better definition throughout. The film's dusty, southwestern Technicolor palette benefits as well, with warm and sumptuous skin tones, rich browns, weathered greens, soft blue skies, and Bonnie's luscious red lips. Black levels plumb the depths, shadow delineation is trouble-free, and contrast is tight but natural, giving the image a strong sense of presence. You may wonder why the picnic scene with Bonnie's mother looks so hazy and indistinct compared to the rest of the film, but this is because cinematographer Burnett Guffrey placed a mesh screen over the lens after director Arthur Penn requested he make the sequence look dreamy and diffused. Purists will happy to note that the film's grain structure is intact, and the print has been cleaned up wonderfully, with only the occasional white speck, and no tears, stains, or hairs. Likewise, the transfer is technically sound, and free of any over compression-related foul-ups.
While the film's transfer is solid, I do wish that Warner had re-pressed this disc with a lossless audio track. Just because the film was originally mixed in mono doesn't mean it wouldn't benefit from high definition audio. I am glad, however, that the studio didn't feel obliged to somehow separate the monaural audio elements into a forced 5.1 mix. So, I'm definitely somewhat ambivalent about the film's Dolby Digital 1.0 track. On one hand, it sounds true to source—dialogue is crisp and free of muffling or dropouts, the sound effects are expectedly dated but completely suitable, and the twangy banjo music, while a little brash and treble-heavy at times, has more than amble presence. On the other hand, I would love to hear what the film would sound like if Warner paid just as much attention to the audio as they did to the visuals. Still, even though it's lossy, this Dolby Digital track shouldn't detract from anyone's enjoyment of the film.
Love and Death: The Story of Bonnie and Clyde (SD, 43:15)
This History Channel documentary has nothing to do with the film and focuses exclusively on the
real-life tale of Bonnie and Clyde, complete with vintage newsreel footage, period accounts, and
interviews with a variety of historians, authors, and even Clyde's sister. The production values are
definitely dated—this looks like it was made in perhaps the early 1990s—but the information is
solid. Well worth watching.
Revolution! The Making of Bonnie and Clyde (SD, 1:05:00)
Directed by famed bonus features documentarian Laurent Bouzereau, this three-part feature
includes interviews with director Arthur Penn, screenwriter Robert Benton, and filmmaker Curtis
Hanson, along with all of the film's principal actors. Bonnie and Clyde's Gang is about the
genesis of the project and the screenplay's French New Wave influences, The Reality and the
Myth of Bonnie and Clyde covers the style of the film and its hodgepodge crew of New
Hollywood upstarts and Old Hollywood veterans, and Releasing Bonnie and Clyde follows
the production of the film through its final cut and controversial release. Fans should expect a
wealth of information.
Deleted Scenes (SD, 5:28 total)
Two scenes are included—The Road to Mineola is about the gang discussing the next
day's robbery at a diner, and Outlaws features Bonnie singing "We're in the Money" in
front of a mirror while C.W. watches from the tub, obviously turned on. Here's what the disc says
about these excised segments: "The following scenes were deleted from Bonnie and Clyde prior to
its 1967 theatrical release. Unfortunately, the audio for these scenes could not be located and is
presumed lost. The dialogue intended for these scenes is available with subtitles, sourced from
the film's original shooting script."
Warren Beatty Wardrobe Tests (SD, 7:41)
See Beatty walk around on film in a variety of period get-ups.
Trailers (SD, 4:11 total)
Includes the teaser trailer and the theatrical trailer.
I really don't understand all the virulent hate for Warner's digibook releases, but if you've been holding out for the studio to release Bonnie and Clyde in the standard Blu-ray keep-case, your wait is over. No changes have been made to the actual disc—though I would've liked to have seen the addition of a lossless audio track—so if you've yet to purchase this influential film, the choice is yours as to whether you want the classy digibook or the run-of-the-mill, fits-on-the-shelf- with-the-rest-of-your-collection standard-issue case. Recommended.
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2016
1972
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Reissue
1968
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40th Anniversary Edition
1975
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2007
Extended Director's Cut
1984
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2012
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1969
2013