Honestly, I expected more from Mann…
(Note: This review might contain spoilers for the film, but most of the events are more or less historical)
I had very mixed feelings about this movie, but mostly I think I was disappointed. Though the movie does have it’s good qualities, and I really did want to like it(possibly mostly due to my love of ”Gangster Films”), quite honestly, it was almost hard to sit through. I think the best way to sum up the film as a whole is this – It’s like Michael Mann put together a very professional film, and then got a bunch of college kids to film it at the last minute.
The first problem I have with this movie is really the only big problem I had with the last Mann film I saw, Collateral; and that is the fact that the film is shot at 60 Frames per Second. Perhaps it’s just personal preference, but I hate this look. It seems amateurish, and sometimes is even nauseating. Granted, the last film Mann did before Public Enemies wasn’t Collateral, it was Miami Vice. But, not having seen that movie(nor having any desire to) I can’t comment on it.
But it wasn’t just the frames. All of the camera work was very, I suppose awkward is the word. It was always either too close or too far away, added to this the fact that they were all very shot cuts. Also, the sound editing in at least the first part of the movie was awful. Half the time my speakers were blaring from gunfire, and the other half I couldn’t understand the actors because they were being drowned out by background noise. Things like that really take you out of the movie.
Now, to the other end of the spectrum. The acting is fantastic, with what to me seems like an all star cast: Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Marion Cotillard, Billy Crudup, Stephen Dorff, Giovanni Ribisi, and many others that you may not know by name but would definitely recognize. Not only were all the these performances great, the costumes and sets were also fantastic. With the believable performances and wonderful sets and costumes, combined with terrible filming and sound editing, the whole movie felt like a really badly shot documentary.
Though my main problem with the film was the look of it, I also didn’t like the flow. That is to say, it didn’t really have one. The movie somehow had the ability to give us too much character development, and not enough at the same time. I assumes the movie’s focus was John Dillinger(Depp), mostly because he was the character with the most scenes. But at the same time the movie would go off for what seemed like forever and focus on FBI men and other gangsters. The thing was, there were just so many characters that you never really got to focus on any of them.
The movie would go on for a while developing Dillinger, and then leave him alone completely, but never really focus on any one person. Melvin Purvis(Bale) seemed to have an almost obsession with catching Dillinger, and not really anyone else, but the movie never tells us why. The only character I kind of cared about was Dillinger, but that was mostly just because of the long scenes between him and Billie Frechette(Cotillard). Really, there were just too many characters.
The best parts of the whole movie, in my opinion, were the deaths of the gangsters – Pretty Boy Floyd, Baby Face Nelson, and Dillinger. These were all shot wonderfully, almost poetically. Those scenes. and those scenes alone, for a moment made me forget about the horrible filming technique. My favorite would have to be Nelson, as he continued to fire his Thomson into the ground while the FBI tries desperately to take him down.
Like I said before, the costumes and scenery – all wonderful, but they seem to almost be passed by. The focus of the cameras is almost always close-ups, so much so that it feels crowded. The only time you really see the sets is in passing in the background. It also almost all seems to be quick cuts, either back and forth or cutting quickly to show each character in a short scene, not stopping to let us appreciate or take in anything.
The third act is by far the best, which granted can be said about a lot of films, but especially this one. Mann gives us time to take in everything that’s going on. We really get to focus on Dillinger as person, not just as a random character. The movie takes some time to slow down, and finally seems to have some flow, not just cutting from scene to scene.
Honestly, the most I could do is give this film a 6.8/10. You combine the good with the bad and really all you’re left with is average.
As for the short-short, this was an idea that came to me the night just before the meeting. I was watching some Mystery Science Theater 3000 videos on YouTube, where they were making fun of those old “Educational Films”; and I thought, what if we did an educational film like that, but instead of out right making fun of it, we do it in satire.