Public Enemies
Back when I was in school, I was always fascinated by the Depression-era gangsters. From their larger-than-life personalities, to their dapper old-timey style, to the unwritten code of ethics the true greats lived and died by. But far and away my favorite gangster of all time was John Dillinger. He was a latter day Robin Hood, sticking it to the very same plutocratic banking establishments that were foreclosing on homes and farms and forcing poor sharecroppers into lives of quiet desperation. Dillinger used his brain rather than violence whenever possible, relying on his quick wit, unflappable charm, and vulpine cunning to get him out of many close scrapes. Many times he would pull off a heist without firing a single shot, and he never took anybody’s money but the bank’s. His actions earned him the admiration of the people, who saw themselves as vicariously taking revenge on the government through Dillinger’s actions. At first he surrounded himself with only men he intimately knew and trusted, until for many reasons, mostly death and incarceration, he was forced to draw from a less desirable pool. This compromise eventually led to his end. But you didn’t come here for a history lesson, you came here to be entertained and that is what the movie Public Enemies purports to deliver.
Director Michael Mann serves up a fast-paced retelling of the Dillinger story, feeling rushed even with the nearly three hours allotted. The story picks up at the humble beginnings of Dillinger’s gang, follows them to their inglorious and sudden end, and then ends a couple more times for good measure to tie up all the loose ends. The camerawork is frenetic and feverish at times with an all-too-often used handheld digital camera following the action with all the shaky cinematic glory of an episode of Cops. This technique is annoying when done by Oliver Stone, and downright nauseating when done by Michael Mann. The frantic camerawork is broken up by extreme close-ups of roast-beef faced G-Men and gangsters, with even the usually pristine Johnny Depp looking scarred, puffy, and pockmarked as Dillinger.
The acting runs the gamut from excellent to bland, depending on who we are talking about. Johnny Depp and Marian Cotillard, who plays Dillinger’s love interest Billie Frechette in this tale, bring subtlety and humanity to these towering roles. Depp shows the sympathetic side of Dillinger (all too briefly thanks to roughshod editing) as he slowly morphs into a more desperate and destructive man , while Cotillard shows a woman madly in love with a man who knows no compromise where she has had a life of nothing but. The romance seems genuine as does Dillinger’s desire to leave the world of crime and settle down.
Opposing Dillinger is FBI agent Melvin Purvis, played by Christian Bale. While I am normally a big fan of Bale’s work, he seemed disinterested in this character. Indeed all of the FBI agents from a cartoonish Hoover all the way down to the heel I dubbed Agent Beatwife, were two-dimensional cardboard cutouts set up as obstacles for Dillinger to avoid or gun down as the situation merited. Also, through the magic of lackluster and slapdash editing, all but the most observant viewer loses track of who’s who among Dillinger’s gang as, with little exception, they are typical generic thugs, even when history says otherwise. At one point in the film, I found myself surprised to see George “Babyface” Nelson alive and well after having just seen his doppelganger gunned down not five minutes prior.
As an avid fan of John Dillinger’s I was able to fill in the blanks and figure out important plot points that were hastily breezed over or not mentioned at all. However, most of the people I went to see this movie with left scratching their heads. The viewer is set up to, much like the public of his time, find themselves rooting for Dillinger, but in this film we aren’t given a strong enough reason to look past his crimes, and that is a true shame.
Public Enemies is a pretty, gritty, and generally well-acted movie that is worth seeing, but could have been world’s better with a director who has the tact and common sense to treat the story with deference and humanity, rather than try and force it into the mold of a Summer blockbuster action/crime drama.
