One of the most extraordinarily handsome screen actors of his generation, Warren Beatty proved remarkably sparing in exploiting his image. That image has tended to seem contradictory, often puzzling, to commentators and critics, but there is universal agreement that no subsequent disappointments in Beatty's work could obscure his achievement in portraying the impotent, crippled, trigger-happy Clyde Barrow, at once inept, ruthless, and curiously touching, in Bonnie and Clyde (1967).

Brilliantly directed and photographed, with meticulous attention paid to historical accuracy, Bonnie and Clyde was a watershed in the then thirty-year-old Beatty's career, for it was he who masterminded the entire project, from buying the script to hiring director Arthur Penn and choosing the cast. The superb production values and style of the film which, in its fearless and poetic use of bloodshed, made it both influential and highly controversial, stamped Warren Beatty as a producer...