Great Acting, No Story

Rating: 5/10 (9 July 2009)

I wanted to love this movie.
Every actor in the movie was lovely, talented, and believable. The writing was dull and sparse. I don't believe that this was a movie about the icon of Dillinger. If that was the intent, then the intent was lost in the awkward filming that moves back and forth between digital and hand-held, high res and low res (i.e., grainy)...and for what purpose? The movie is mixed up. Maybe the movie wanted to be too may things, action, love story, biography...and so it failed to be any of those things.
I felt a loss after finishing the movie because there is no insight offered about the man or about the myth of the man. I wanted to know more about Dillinger, or at the very least, be told a captivating story, even a version of his life, or a caricature would have been better. Sadly, no story was there. A taste of each genre, each possibility, but no meat, no matter, no content. The story was presented with the depth of a child's biography or a five minute video clip. I found out more about Dillinger on YouTube.
The actors were captivating. Bravo to the cast, and cameramen, and cinematographers...it was beautiful at times, patchy at others.