‘Gun Crazy’: a cult film noir gem
Almost 20 years before Arthur Penn made the seminal Bonnie and Clyde, Joseph H Lewis directed Gun Crazy, which featured a similar outlaw couple by the names of Laurie and Bart (although imagining Serge Gainsbourg and Brigitte Bardot singing their names doesn’t exactly have the same ring to it). Played by Peggy Cummins and John Dall, the pair are the stars of this criminally underrated crime noir released in 1950, which certainly doesn’t get enough credit for its innovative approach to storytelling and its depiction of gender and eroticism that was considerably ahead of its time.
In an era when the Hays Code meant that Hollywood had to censor anything remotely scandalous, it’s impressive that Gun Crazy was even made. It’s a sexually-charged tale of criminality that descends from bank robberies to murder, with the couple at the heart of the film united by a love of firearms. It’s a quintessentially American story: two gun-loving individuals are drawn together, the thrill of wielding a pistol—an undeniably phallic symbol associated with strength, power, and freedom—echoing their sexual desire for each other. It’s clear that they both derive an intense pleasure from using their weapons or watching the other shoot, especially for Bart, who is captivated by the impressively skilled gunslinger, Laurie, whom he meets at a carnival.
There’s an underlying level of competition and electricity that runs through their relationship, and they can’t get enough of each other. However, it soon becomes them against the world as they run out of money and vow to live freely via criminal means, like robbing stores. In one fantastic scene, they carry out a heist while the camera remains in the backseat, and it feels distinctively Godardian, although it wouldn’t be another ten years until the release of Breathless.
We become accomplices as Bart goes into the shop while Laurie talks to an officer, and as the security alarm rings, the camera pans back as Laurie stabs the policeman in the neck before she jumps in the car with Bart, and they drive away. It’s a genius scene that throws us right into the heart of the action, yet we don’t get to actually see the robbery. This is arguably more effective, however, with the tension of the sequence more palpable as we wait for it to play out with Laurie.
Cummins’ portrayal of Laurie is fantastic, and at a time when Hollywood archetypes were still quite common, like the damsel in distress, she quickly proves to be much more strong-minded, ruthless, and powerful than Bart. She’s an expert with her gun, and she’s dedicated to a life of crime if it means escaping the humdrum life expected of her as a woman. She doesn’t subscribe to social norms, and instead, she goes out in search of kicks, and for her, she finds it in the world of sex, guns, and stealing, with the erotically-charged relationship between her and Bart providing her with a sense of fulfilment.
This was a time when America promised its citizens freedom and financial success if they conformed to the demands of capitalism. The supposed ‘Land of the Free’ could be walked upon if you gave up your deepest desires and inner dreams. However, Laurie rebels against this notion, even if she takes a rather violent and anarchic path to find her own definition of freedom and liberation.
Ultimately, the couple find this search for freedom futile, and like many New Hollywood movies that would come at the end of the next decade, like Bonnie and Clyde and Easy Rider, the film depicts the flimsiness of the ‘American Dream’. It seems that few people can actually get what they want.
Gun Crazy is a magnificent feature, and it was even written by Dalton Trumbo while blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee for his Communist leanings. You can sense his disillusionment with America in the film: no one, good or bad, can make it out alive.
