My Review of Public Enemies
Ok. I came into this movie expecting a great bank robbery action flick, that was how the movie was advertised, and that is how it was described in the many good reviews it received.
Somehow, this movie failed on nearly everything it promised.
I'll start with what initially set me off, within the first 2 minutes of the movie, I hated the camerawork and cinematography. throughout the movie it uses that documentary style camera angles and the camera is awfully shakey, and not even in good taste, like used in The Office.
It seems like the camera men were a bunch of slightly drunk college students in wheelchairs! The camera was often below the actors, looking up at them, constantly shaking. During the action scenes the shaking often got so bad that it would take away from the experience, and often nauseating. Not to mention the action was bland, and badly choreographed, just mindless tommy gun shooting from behind cover, until someone important died, or a character ran off. There were no tide turning moments in the fights, just shoot. duck. shoot. die. speed off.
This movie is about one of the greatest bank robbers of the great depression right? so why are there only about two and a half bank robbery scenes, and both scenes less than 5 minutes long? The robberies are too short and few to show how Dillinger is the great crook that he is. The only motivations they give Dillinger for what he does are "my daddy hit me a lot when I was young because it was the only way he knew how to raise me"... ok, that just barely explains why Dillinger could have gone down the path of crime that he did, but it sure would have been nice to see or hear more about how he got to be the way he is.
The script was unimaginative, containing literally zero interesting dialogue. The relationship Depp and his girl had seemed pointless, there is really no motivation behind their love for eachother, they just do because its in the script. Oh, did I mention the screenplay was also terrible? It's all just so, boring. that is the best word to describe it. Take for example the scene where Dillinger and his girlfriend meet. They see eachother in a club, Dillinger lays down some simple wisdom. "I like money, fast cars, liquor, and you". After that they are practically a couple. I understand that the movie is already 2 hours long, and they couldnt realistically fit in "petty" details like that, so why didnt Michael Mann decide to shorten some of the lengthy, boring, frequent gun fights and fit in the details that would have given the plot more depth? Public Enemies needs more of a background story to Dillinger and his romance.
I found one redeeming quality to this movie. The end. The best acting depp does in the movie is in the last 20 minutes. And the horrible bland mess of a non-existant story is wrapped up fairly respectively, but still, not very interestingly.
Dont get me wrong, the end to Public Enemies is not enough to save the horrible mess of a film this badly turned out to be.
Save yourself two hours of your life and Don't see Public Enemies.
