Public Enemies
Short description
Set during the Great Depression, Public Enemies follows John Dillinger, a bank robber whose daring holdups and repeated prison escapes made him a popular figure among Americans who blamed the banks for their hardship. His notoriety turned him into a national problem for J. Edgar Hoover, who used the manhunt to raise the profile of his Bureau of Investigation, the agency that would become the FBI. Hoover named Dillinger the country's first Public Enemy Number One and put his best agent, Melvin Purvis, on his trail. The film is drawn from Bryan Burrough's book about the crime wave of the 1930s and the rise of federal law enforcement.
Michael Mann directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Ann Biderman and Ronan Bennett, and produced it with Kevin Misher. It was Mann's tenth feature, arriving between Miami Vice and Blackhat. Johnny Depp plays Dillinger, Christian Bale plays Purvis, Marion Cotillard plays Billie Frechette, and Billy Crudup appears as Hoover, among a credited cast of more than a hundred.
Released in July 2009, the film cost about 100 million dollars and returned roughly 214 million worldwide, a modest multiple of its budget. It received moderately positive notices, with a critics' rating of 6.6 out of 10 from 278 reviews; on IMDb it holds 6.9 from 334,000 votes and on TMDB 6.7 from 4,967 votes, so audiences and critics landed close together.
What's left behind the scenes
- During the shootout at 'Little Bohemia' in the film, Nelson, Van Meter, and other criminals are killed. In reality, none of the criminals were killed; only Pete Pierpont was wounded (and was already in prison at the time). 'Little Bohemia' remains a shameful chapter in FBI history: all the criminals escaped, while the agents killed an innocent local resident and wounded several others; one FBI agent was also killed.
- As a result of the writers' strike, director Michael Mann was able to enlist Johnny Depp and Marion Cotillard for the project, as the projects they were filming at the time were postponed.
- The film depicts Pretty Boy Floyd and Baby Nelson being killed before John Dillinger, but in reality, they both outlived him by several months, each becoming 'Public Enemy No. 1' after Dillinger's death. Pretty Boy Floyd died on October 22, 1934, and Baby Nelson on November 27, 1934. Alvin Karpis, the fourth and last gangster designated 'Public Enemy No. 1' by the FBI and portrayed in the film by Giovanni Ribisi, died on August 26, 1979.
- Filming began on March 17, 2008.
- In the film's finale, the protagonist watches 'Manhattan Melodrama' starring Clark Gable.
- Depp played Dillinger at around 46 years of age, while the real John Dillinger died at 31.
- Michael Mann began developing the script for a film about John Dillinger back in the 1970s. The opening of FBI archives in the early 2000s (and the publication of Brian Barrow's book, 'Enemies of Society: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI') provided a new impetus for the film's creation.
- Filming took place in seven cities in the state of Illinois, seven cities in Wisconsin, one city in Indiana, and also in Miami.
- In the film, Johnny Depp's character tells a bank customer, “We don’t want your money, only the bank’s.” The same line is spoken by Robert De Niro’s character in 'Heat' (1995).
- Leonardo DiCaprio was originally planned to play the lead role.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
