Firepower!

Rating: 9/10 (29 May 2009)

--Rama's SCREEN--
PUBLIC ENEMIES is what Firepower is all about. You'll never see a more exciting gunfight and shoot out this year. Director Michael Mann has crafted the ultimate cat-and-mouse game, his best work yet. Non stop thriller action that takes only a few minutes to breathe in between before it takes you down again for a joy ride. Christian Bale and Johnny Depp are charismatic and unstoppable, the new Robert De Niro and Al Pacino of Heat. You're gonna wanna see PUBLIC ENEMIES again and again. It makes you wanna get a tommy gun. Hands down, one of the best movies of the year.
I'm a big fan of Michael Mann's work, except Miami Vice. That one didn't quite live up to expectations. But Mann's return with PUBLIC ENEMIES doesn't disappoint. When I got to meet him briefly at a screening, I knew I was in the presence of somebody's just downright awesome. You can tell from PUBLIC ENEMIES that he's brought back his signature marks, signs where you can easily tell it's a Mann's movie. He doesn't try to come up with CG backdrop to give us a sight of an old 1930s city, he puts the camera on a tight leash and just focus on the characters and the art deco buildings. And just like his other action/thriller movies in the past, it always ends in the evening or there'll be a massive showdown between two opposing parties in the middle of the dead night. Mann knows what the audiences would be rooting for in this type of movie, he makes sure that when Dillinger and his men make their getaway after a robbing a bank, they'd do it in style. Cinematographer Dante Spinottie who's worked with Mann before knows what the master filmmaker wants and what we get are shots that give that reality impression and definitely heavy emphasis on the well-choreographed violence. I enjoy how the movie likes to keep using Otis Taylor's catchy song 'Ten Million Slaves', somehow it fits perfectly in the presentation.
Johnny Depp is the epitome of cool, he knows it and uses it to the fullest for this role. His character John Dillinger's got enough charm and confidence to spare but only has eyes for one lady. If you thought the way Jack Sparrow carried himself was infectious, wait til you see how Johnny Depp plays John Dillinger, he's a bad guy who loves being infamous. The unlikely Robin Hood in a time of Great Depression when people could care less about the banks he robs. Christian Bale who plays special Agent Melvin Purvis assigned to hunt down Dillinger, is as excellent as Depp. It's like having 2 heavyweight fighters in a ring and the match is long overdue. They both keep each other on their toes. Bale has been known as an actor who can listen well and mimic any accent. He puts down a great effort to sound like he wasn't born in Wales. Great star-studded cast overall, Michael Mann's lucky enough to have excellent actors signing up from left and right to play both members of the gang and members of the FBI including Billy Crudup who captures young Edgar Hoover's insecure, arrogant and stubborn personality down pat. Marion Cotillard gives a great supporting performance as the girlfriend who's willing to risk everything for a man she barely knows. She's not an easy woman for Dillinger to conquer.
What really will get you hooked, once again, is the cat and mouse game. Purvis catches Dillinger but Dillinger gets away, Purvis closing in on Dillinger but Dillinger is one step ahead of all of them. You see many different ways it's done throughout the entire movie and you'll get entertained every single time. Just when you thought the bad guy's captured and the good guy gets all the gory, the game begins again.
I'm glad Mann decided to take the story up a notch by not just making it about Dillinger Vs. Purvis, it's about what would happen when a man is pushed to the point of desperation. You never work with or never ever trust a desperate man, that's the theme that you see in the character development. Both Dillinger and Purvis are good at what they do, but then circumstances happen that would turn them into desperate men. Alienated by his business partners, Dillinger starts to lose what makes him hard to catch in the first place. Without realizing it he starts to create predictable patterns and habits that would eventually get him easily fooled, he becomes unaware of unwanted surprises . Pressured by Edgar Hoover, Melvin Purvis finds himself allowing certain methods to get Dillinger, the ends justify the means is the result. Some say that Michael Mann's endings rarely hit the level of satisfactory, I say PUBLIC ENEMIES' ending won't let you down, without being too extravagant, it concludes itself just the right way.
--Rama's SCREEN--