PUBLIC ENEMIES (2009) - DIR: MICHAEL MANN

So while laying upon my heating pad over the weekend after completely blowing out my back, the decision for a "chill out" type of film came down to three things: the brilliant Marlon Brando film ONE EYED JACKS, the vastly-underrated Warner Brothers JUSTICE LEAGUE cartoon, which I'd match up against any live action show on prime-time t.v. easily, and Michael Mann's biopic on the gangster with the giant penis John Dillinger, PUBLIC ENEMIES. I chose the latter film for one reason and one reason only: I fucking LOVE tommy guns!!

It's easy to see the allure of the gangster era in our country, and Mann certainly illustrates the attraction of that life. When love-of-his-life Billie (Marion Cotillard) asks Dillinger what he wants to do, he responds "Anything I want". Obviously a romantic notion, a notion that is only quantified by the casting of Johnny Depp as Dillinger. Easily one of the most unique and engaging actors of his generation, Depp not only casts his spell on the audience but, as Dillinger, casts a spell on the media, fellow cons and crooks, and even the police and feds in charge of tracking him down. Of course, Mann doesn't hold back on the consequences of following this life, and pretty much everyone in the film on the "wrong" side of the law ends up bloody and broken...and dead!

The cinematography and production need a special mention. The film easily transports the viewer to a time when being a bank robber really was a lucrative career, and the shots of sprawling Chicago banks and dark moodily-lit Indiana air-fields only adds to the atmosphere. It's a shame the film doesn't completely pull you in, but that's through no fault of the look of the film. We never really get behind Dillinger's motivations, and it leaves you with the image in your mind of a postcard from another place with nothing written on the other side. Still, tommy guns!! And so, in closing:

HERE'S WHAT YOU WILL SEE:

-TOMMY GUNS!!!!

HERE'S WHAT YOU WON'T SEE:
-that piece of oak Channing Tatum in more than a 2 minute roll as Pretty Boy Floyd! Yay for Christian Bale blowing him away in the opening minutes!!!

Final Grade: B+