Gun CrazyGun Crazy is the very essence of film noir, a low-budget, high-octane thriller whose reputation has grown with every passing year since its first appearance in 1950. While its story of two doomed lovers, crashing through the small towns of the mid-West, running the gauntlet of hold-ups and shoot-outs to a bloody nemesis, owes much to the true-life tale of Bonnie and Clyde, the film achieves an intense poetry eloquently expressive of the dark side of the American Dream. The film's origins in the skid-row operation of the King Brothers are expertly described by Jim Kitses. He traces "Gun Crazy"'s roots in the rain-slicked, night-time world of noir, and in the postwar American society that gave birth to it. He teases out the effects of the Production Code, and the distinctive contributions of director Joseph H. Lewis, writers MacKinlay Kantor and the blacklisted Dalton Trumbo, and stars, Peggy Cummins and John Dall. Above all, Kitses provides a wonderfully alert and informative reading of a small masterpiece, a film that rises triumphantly above the modesty of its means. |
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action Armour audience auteur B-movie Bart and Laurie Bart Tare Bart's BFI Film Classics BFI Publishing Bonnie and Clyde Breen office Capra's career carnival Cashville censors cinema classic noir close-up couple couple's cowboys crime Cummins's Dalton Trumbo dance dark director Double Indemnity earlier ethic expression femme fatale film noir film's final frame Frank King frontier gangster Genre Godard Gun Crazy Gun Crazy's Hampton heroic Hollywood icons ideology interview John John Dall Joseph Breen Joseph H Kantor's original killing King Brothers Laurie's Lewis Lewis's London looking MacKinlay Kantor Millard Kaufman mise-en-scène Monogram movie myth narrative noir hero noir's opening Packy Paul Schrader Peggy Cummins performance play post-war Production Code File provides Rangers and Growers release robbery role romantic Russell Harlan scene screen screwball script shadow shooting shot signifiers story studio style success suggest violence Western window woman York young