Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie and Clyde find themselves in the distant yet utterly connected realm of the couple on the run. Taken in reference to the New Wave, I can see the connection in the sort of futility of their situation, and (at least relative to Godard’s films) in the materialism at the root of it all. But for them, it is about fame above all else. Fame is their commodity and the thing which drives them to continue the brigade. Fame may not justify to them the murder and the thieving, but is surely reason enough. In fact, it is all there is. They make little money through robbery, but continue partly because they can do nothing else, but mostly because they have become celebrities of a sort, and are working to sustain and further this status. The image created of the two is highly romanticized and almost iconic. The two revel in reading stories in the papers depicting their latest jobs. They thrive on all of this, and apparently love each other, though for the majority of the film Clyde’s impotence stands (comically) as a frustration for Bonnie, though she pretends to accept it. Thus, Clyde seems to be less of some rebelling, tough, fearless criminal and more of an underdeveloped, overgrown child, compensating for this ineptitude with the phallic power of his gun and his “indifference,” while Bonnie is actually, in contrast to her iconic image in the papers, weak and scared. The crime spree enables them both to be something their not.