Showing posts with label Warren Beatty. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Warren Beatty. Show all posts

Friday, 4 November 2022

The Parallax View

 Year:  1974

Director:  Alan J. Pakula

Screenplay:  David Giler and Lorenzo Semple Jr., based on the novel The Parallax View by Loren Singer

Starring:  Warren Beatty, Hume Cronyn, William Daniels, Paula Prentiss

Running Time:  102 minutes

Genre:  Thriller


Three years after a politician is murdered at the Seattle Space Needle, the witnesses seem to be dying of apparent accidents or natural causes.  Television journalist Lee Carter (Prentiss) who witnessed the murder is convinced that the witnesses are being deliberately killed, and that she is next on the list.  She contacts her ex-boyfriend, hard-bitten newspaper reporter Joe Frady (Beatty) for help.  Joe doesn't believe her at first, until Lee dies of an apparent drug overdose.  Joe starts to investigate and finds himself drawn into a complex and dangerous conspiracy, centred around the sinister Parallax Corporation.

 As American as apple pie

Based on the 1970 novel by Loren Singer, with an intelligent and sometimes darkly funny screenplay by David Giles and Lorenzo Semple Jr., The Parallax View is a surprisingly bleak work, with a genuinely shocking conclusion, but it still has all the ingredient of an exciting thriller: fights, chases (including an impressive car chase), and a desperate race against time.  Warren Beatty gives an impressive performance as the tough, but surprisingly vulnerable reporter, whose silver tongue and quick fists do little to top him quickly getting out of his depth.  Director Alan J. Pakula, who had previously made Klute (1971) and would go on to make All the President's Men (1976) creates an atmosphere of chilly menace.  Throughout the film there is this constant sense of a vast conspiracy, even the way the film is photographed, with many scenes being viewed from a distance, or from overhead, putting the viewer in the place of a spy observing the proceedings.  The film's most impressive set-piece is the striking assassin training sequence where a series of fragmented still images and words are flashed in quick sensation.  Following the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, not to mention Watergate and Richard Nixon, the 1970s were an era of bleak political thrillers, but the theme of paranoia, alienation and conspiracy still feels very much of the moment.  


The Parallax View
  

Monday, 18 July 2022

Bonnie and Clyde

 Year:  1967

Director:  Arthur Penn

Screenplay:  David Newman and Robert Benton

Starring:  Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, Estelle Parsons

Running Time:  111 minutes

Genre:  Crime


Texas, 1930s:  Bored waitress Bonnie Parker (Dunaway) is desperate for some excitement in her life.  She thinks that she has found what she is looking for when she meets charismatic thief Clyde Barrow (Beatty).    Along with dim-witted mechanic C. W. Moss (Pollard), Clyde's tough older brother Buck (Hackman) and Buck's highly strung wife, Blanche (Parsons), Bonnie and Clyde embark on a violent crime spree across the southern United States, robbing banks and shops.  Along the way they become celebrities, as well as the target of every lawman in the USA.

"They're young.  They're in love.  And they kill people."

- Poster tagline for Bonnie and Clyde

Loosely based on the real life exploits of Depression era bank-robbers Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker, this became one of the most iconic films of the 1960s.  Heavily criticised at the time for it's then groundbreaking violence, as well as it's glamorising of the ruthless duo, this nevertheless became a smash hit, helping to usher the so-called "New Hollywood" of the 1970s as well as influencing any number of "lovers on the run" films such as Badlands (1973), Wild at Heart (1990), True Romance (1993) and Natural Born Killers (1994).  Screenwriters Robert Benton and David Newman were heavily influence by the French New Wave movement, and their original choice to direct the film was François Truffaut, who passed on the project.  However, Truffaut and the French New Wave influenced several elements of the film, including the changes in tone, the choppy editing, and slow-motion sequences.  Warren Beatty, who produced the film, is perfectly cast as is Faye Dunaway, and the two have real chemistry.  Michael J. Pollard plays naive, moon-faced C. W. Moss, the gang's getaway driver and mechanic.  Pollard, who was pretty much unknown at the time, and was nominated for the Academy Award, Golden Globe and BAFTA got so much attention for the role that he announced a joke candidacy for President of the Unites States, which inspired a novelty song by Jim Lowe called "Michael J. Pollard for President".  Gene Hackman was also Oscar nominated for his role as Clyde's older brother Buck.  Estelle Parsons plays preacher's daughter Blanche, who is married to Buck, and becomes a reluctant a reluctant member of the gang.  Blanche and Bonnie's mutual hatred of each other threatens to undo the group from within.  After viewing the film, the real Blanche Barrow complained about her depiction saying: "That film made me look like a screaming horse's ass!"  Comedian Gene Wilder makes his screen debut in the film as a nerdy undertaker who is kidnapped by the gang.  

While the film is not now as shocking as it was in 1967, it is still a striking film, which has aged surprisingly well.  The tone of the film moves from humour to tragedy, from warmth to cold, stylised violence.  The tone changes in the same scene, the action scenes are often shown as comical slapstick, which then moves into shocking, graphic violence.  Amongst the brutality there are moments of humanity and tenderness, the gang joke around and okay games, take photographs of themselves and Bonnie immortalises their adventures in poetry.  The romance between Bonnie and Clyde is genuinely moving.  The film was released by Warner Bros., who specialised in gangster movies throughout the thirties, and Bonnie and Clyde brings together Old Hollywood glamour, with European experimentalism, to create a new type of American film.      



"I'm Miss Bonnie Parker, this here's Clyde Barrow.  We rob banks."  Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty as Bonnie and Clyde