Some style or substance or anything

Rating: 4/10 (2 July 2009)

If the motives of the depression era gangsters were indeed as murky as the lighting and editing of "Public Enemies" then there may have been a better story to be told. In reality, they were thrill-seeking predators who lived as long as time permitted. Michael Mann sees no need to limit the time it takes him to tell his stories, and he certainly has little care for his audience's time.
The film feels under lit, often out of focus, and scenes play with little sense of dramatic or cinematic structure. Characters become difficult to distinguish from each other and often it is hard to figure out really what is at stake other than the inevitable capture of Dillinger. The editing in the first half of the film is particularly gratuitous and confusing when coupled with the hand held camera work and dour, flat lighting; the viewer's eye can make no sense of the composition or relationship of shot to shot and is instead presented with a scramble of action.
There have been so many well told depression era gangster stories over the years, but "Public Enemies" will not rank among them, as in general, the amount of talent that is ultimately squandered in this film, from the cast, Director of Photography, and Editors, to the score and Sound Mixing, illustrates that Michael Mann is a man not unlike Dillinger in his own way: it is inevitable that he will continue to go on until someone stops him.