Surprisingly Disappointing

Rating: 6/10 (11 July 2010)

I'm an admirer of Michael Mann films, and when I heard about this project, I got quite excited by the prospect of the famously meticulous director working with the equally obsessive, and detail-oriented Christian Bale. Oh, and I suppose the idea of Johnny Depp as Dillinger in a high budget period piece didn't hurt either. Unfortunately, one can't watch a Michael Mann film without drawing comparisons to his best work, and on that note, it doesn't live up to the man's incredible standards.
Let's put it this way: it lacks the suspense and existential banter of Collateral, the character play and development of Heat, the action of Last of the Mohicans, and the simple brilliance of The Insider. It does, however, borrow many of the negative factors in previous Mann films: the too-conventional love story from Last of the Mohicans that feels rushed and poorly strung together, the pacing of The Insider, and the sometimes too-obsessive attention to historical detail as in the case of Ali. That brings me to my next point, which is that Mann obsesses over some very small details, making sure that they are authentic to the way history has written them, while taking huge creative liberties with others. What makes this frustrating is that it's hard to see the pay-off when he chooses to be creative, and when he chooses to get bogged down in details.
From a technical standpoint, I'm not opposed to the use of digital photography, which has proved itself as a dependable medium (Benjamin Button, Collateral, Sin City etc.); however, the choice of colour pallet and minimalist lighting makes this film incredibly ugly to watch, and is one of the few overtly digital quality films I've seen where you know for every frame that this wasn't film. I imagine that Mann did this in order to differentiate himself from other period films, like The Untouchables (DePalma), which depicts prohibition era Chicago in an all-too-self-aware grandeur. Having said that, it's still no excuse for some of the really poor setups where you can see the actors' make-up, which is distracting, and takes you out of the experience. And perhaps it was the theatre I was in, but I've heard many similar complaints about a bad sound mix. Due in part to this latter fact, I felt the movie lacked a sense of rhythm, and never quite found its stride.
In the end, this film is not as thought-provoking as Mann's previous works, and it really lacks the two-way head-to-head that Heat did so well. In that film, one got a sense of the cat- and-mouse struggle despite the two opposing leads sharing very little screen time. In this film, you know that Purvis (Bale) is chasing Dillinger, but you only know this because you're told; otherwise, it's really like two separate films, both of which lack any sense of urgency between either party to take the other out. It also lacks a great deal of excitement, even in what should be its most riveting moments. I still say see it, but go in without expectations, otherwise they'll be dashed.