'Public Enemies' an unfulfilling ride

• By JOHN WIRT
• Movie critic
• Published: Jul 1, 2009

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A gangster movie, a love story and an American tale of power, class and political ambition, the Johnny Depp-starring Public Enemies is less than the sum of its sometimes compelling parts.

Action-crime drama that the film is, there are spectacular gun battles, waged in large part with Thompson submachine guns. Pursuits by the Bureau of Investigation, the J. Edgar Hoover-led agency that later became the FBI, crackle with heat, too, as the Bureau’s heavily-armed human targets return fire with everything they’ve got.

The love story shared by Hoover’s public enemy No. 1, John Dillinger, and the beautiful outcast the bank robber woos in no-nonsense-style, Billie Frechette, is another of Public Enemies’ engaging ingredients. Even in the fleeting days the two spend together, the Chicago coat-check girl and famous gangster create a loving bond.

Much of the rest of Public Enemies leaves something to be desired, beginning with the newly developed Sony high-definition cameras director Michael Mann and director of photography Dante Spinotti use to tell the tale.

There are beautiful shots of grand public spaces, including banks, but the filmmakers’ technically advanced cameras don’t necessarily serve this period piece well. Imagery in the 1933 and ’34-set Public Enemies can be jarringly bright and modern. Hyperactive editing and perpetually moving, hand-held camera work employed for the film’s busy opening sequences are more distracting than exciting.

Playing Dillinger, Depp gets in his character’s way. Perhaps the actor is a victim of his fame. Unlike a number of great biopics from recent years — Ray, The Queen and Capote come to mind — Public Enemies often appears to be more a vehicle for a movie star than a film about John Dillinger. Of course, the film is a vehicle for Depp, but it wouldn’t be asking too much that it also be a modestly insightful portrait of the legendary gangster.

Nonetheless, Depp applies a wry personal charm to his character and the script (by Mann, Ronan Bennett and Ann Biderman) carefully adds lines and scenes that present Hoover’s public enemy No. 1 as America’s No. 1 folk hero. Outlaw or not, Depp’s smooth criminal is the good guy, especially next to Hoover, a power-hungry publicity hound, and bureau agents who step on the dark side of morality after their leader directs them to, “As they say in Italy these days … take off the white gloves.”

Billy Crudup makes a strong, albeit unflattering, impression during his brief appearances as Hoover, but Public Enemies needs a stronger prime nemesis than Christian Bale’s blank-faced Melvin Purvis. Bale’s Bureau of Investigation field boss is even upstaged by another G-man. Imported from Texas, sharp-shooting, old school-agent Charles Winstead, played by veteran character actor Stephen Lang, gets the most out of his key scenes with Depp and Frechette.

Playing Dillinger’s girlfriend, Frechette, Oscar-winning French actress Marion Cotillard (La Vie en Rose) wins hearts even though her supposedly Midwestern accent is but a distant approximation thereof. The warmth she and Depp generate gives Public Enemies its greatest emotional resonance.