There were so many famed outlaws during the early 30s that I chose to do another one. My choice is John Dillinger, and the movie is Michael Mann’s Public Enemies. It originated as a book by journalist Bryan Burrough’s Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI. It encompassed all the great criminals and Burroughs hoped to see it turned into a dramatic miniseries. After a few twists and turns, however, it became a theatrical film with a singular focus on John Dillinger.
John
Dillinger grew into a troublesome youth in Mooresville, Indiana and committed a
robbery. He was sentenced to a surprisingly harsh sentence of ten to twenty
years in prison. Instead of turning him straight, his incarceration hardened
him and kept him around experienced criminals who taught him all sorts of
things. When he came out, he developed into the infamous bank robber. Like
Bonnie and Clyde, he received exaggerated press and some romanticizing, but
even professional historians and journalists note that he had his good
qualities. This made him a good subject for Michael Mann, who specializes in
showing the good and bad sides of cops and criminals alike.
Most of what’s in Public Enemies is true, but jumbled around chronologically for narrative purposes. For example, the Sioux Falls Robbery combines elements of three of Dillinger’s crimes, with Dillinger’s wounding and the incident of a teen jumping onto the back of one of the robbers before being thrown off through a window. In another example, the Little Bohemia hideout and shooting actually occurred after, not before, the arrest of Dillinger’s girlfriend Billy Frechette (Marion Cotillard, more on her later). Furthermore, Baby Face Nelson, while present, made his escape and would actually die four months later than Dillinger on November 27, 1934. While the chronology is mixed, Mann did go to a lot of trouble to shoot on real sites and even had some locations altered to look more like they did back in the 30's.
