Johnny Depp portrays legendary Depression-era bank robber John Dillinger in Michael Mann’s revisionist Public Enemies, an action saga exploring the icon’s late career. Mann’s blistering style lends itself to the film’s intensely choreographed jailbreak and robbery sequences, where police and gangsters exchange military levels of firepower. Full of attentive period detail (but without overplaying it) and shot with documentary-like realism, the film also follows eager bureau chief Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale) as he hunts Dillinger and Co., egged on by his slimy boss J. Edgar Hoover (Billy Crudup).
“It’s a fascinating moment in history, and Mann captures the cars, the guns and the buildings with painstaking, immersive authenticity.” – Trevor Johnston, Time Out
“Director Michael Mann has taken the story of John Dillinger, and has made from it a drama full of dread and atmosphere, a 140-minute film that in no way seems long, that’s a succession of compelling scenes, with no dead wood.” – Mick LaSalle, SF Gate
“Mann’s exhilarating movie exists in a state of perpetual forward motion. Even when Dillinger is at rest, Public Enemies exudes a nervous tension, the sense that flight is imminent.” – Scott Foundas, Village Voice
Director Michael Mann discusses where John Dillinger’s ‘white-hot trajectory’ fits into his macho career in an interview with The Guardian.
