100 BEFORE YOURE OUT

A thrilling end to the list

BONNIE AND CLYDE (1967) DIRECTOR Arthur Penn STARRING Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Gene Hackman TIME 130 minutes Iwonder if it is an exaggeration to say that most of the violence you see on screen today can be traced back to Bonnie and Clyde. Arthur Penn's story about two bank robbers who got famous killing people during the early Depression years, was savage, shocking and tragic (the film's tagline said: They're young. They are in love. And they kill people). Of course Bonnie and Clyde were going to die but the climactic, slow-motion dance of death in which the two are riddled with bullets, was both horrific and seductive. Film critic David Thomson called the ending 'orgasmic.' He wrote: Had there ever been a moment in which the equation of sex and violence was so emphatic or transporting? Bonnie and Clyde is widely credited with bringing a European sensibility to American cinema (in fact the film was first pitched to Francois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Goddard). But its graphic violence, subversive shifts of mood and pitiless tone was bewildering for studio bosses and some film critics Bosley Crowther, the influential critic of The New York Times described the film as 'a cheap piece of bald-faced slapstick comedy.' But eventually Bonnie and Clyde found its audience and its rightful place in film history (it also won 10 Oscar nominations). A few months after the film's release, Crowther was retired from the paper. TEESRI MANZIL (1966) DIRECTOR Vijay Anand STARRING Shammi Kapoor, Asha Parekh, Helen TIME 172 minutes Teesri Manzil is one of Hindi cinema's most crackling thrillers. Even before the titles are over, a girl is dead fallen or pushed from the third floor and potential murderers and motives have been introduced. But before we find out 'whodunit,' we get romance, comedy and some of the most sparkling set-piece song sequences ever put on film. Has anything ever matched up to Helen gyrating in the iris of a giant eye in O haseena zulfonwali or the synchronised shaking of bee-hive hair-dos in Aaja Aaja. The story by Nasir Hussain takes some convoluted detours do ignore the business about the heroine, Sunita played by Asha Parekh, trying to avenge her sister's death by luring the main suspect, a drummer named Rocky, into the mountains and then having a girl's hockey team beat him. But even when the plot becomes silly, R. D Burman's superb soundtrack smoothens the ride. And then there's the irresistible Shammi Kapoor, in all his hip-swiveling, Elvis Presleyglory. Few thrillers are this much fun on the sidelines, you might also notice the handsome, young Salim Khan who gave acting a shot before picking up the pen.

ANUPAMA CHOPRA