Public Enemies Review

This movie failed to deliver the goods. The story had potential but ends up coming short most notably for its poor plot and bad camera work.

The movie gets off to a slow start and never really goes anywhere. There is little character development. With multiple jailbreaks, bank robberies and shootouts there’s a lot going and at the same time not enough. You are introduced to a lot of characters, which are then missing for the rest of the film.

Johnny DeppJohnny Depp puts on a good performance but it seems almost as if he’s holding back. I guess you can say he was trying to be the real Dillinger keep true to the facts. In doing this it’s as if he has failed to create a character that we can connect with.

The biggest thing missing from this film is the characterization. Why should we care about these characters? Who are they? How does anything that go on in the movie matter to us now? There’s no real human element.

For the most part it feels like your watching a bunch of scenes that seemingly have nothing to do with one another. It doesn’t seem to have a consistent timeline; you keep jumping forward without knowing how much time has gone by.

The cinematography was horrible for such a big film you would expect a lot more. The camera is handheld and shaky even when there is no movement by the actors. It felt like I was watching one of those reenactments that you see on something like the history channel. It was hard to get into the movie when the camera can’t stay still it’s distracting and does not work for this film.

Another thing was the sound design. There were times when you couldn’t hear what any of the characters were saying it sounded muffled and at times the soundtrack was distracting it would pull you away from the very movie your trying to get sucked into.

I had high hopes for this film especially with Johnny Depp and Christian BaleChristian Bale being in it and although I did enjoy parts of it (mostly the shootouts with the Tommy Guns) I did leave the theatre feeling cheated.

PUBLIC ENEMIES trailer