"Crowther's reviews sparked a national debate among critics, who were divided over the film. Like Crowther, many critics accused the filmmakers of glorifying the couple's violent, criminal lifestyle. Time magazine accused Beatty and Penn of reducing Bonnie and Clyde’s story to a "strange and purposeless mingling of fact and claptrap that teeters easily on the brink of burlesque." In his review for Films in Review, Page Cook dismissed the film as "incompetently written, acted, directed and produced" and accused the filmmakers of promoting the idea that "sociopathology is art." Newsweeks Joe Morgenstern initially panned the film, calling it "a squalid shoot ’em-up for the moron trade." But then he did something rare for a critic—he retracted his own review. His second review starts with an apology: "I am sorry to say I consider that review grossly unfair and regrettably inaccurate. I am sorrier to say that I wrote it." Although he still believed the film’s "gore goes too far," he acknowledged the value of the film's violent content: "But art can certainly reflect life, clarify and improve life; and since most of humanity teeters on the edge of violence every day, there is no earthly reason why art should not turn violence to its own good ends, showing us what we do and why.""