Public Enemies
About the Film
At the height of the Great Depression, celebrity bank robber John Dillinger blazes across the Midwest, breaking out of jails and emptying bank vaults while a captivated public cheers him on. He falls hard for coat-check girl Billie Frechette and dreams of a life with her — even as the noose tightens.
Determined to bring him down, the young FBI under J. Edgar Hoover puts agent Melvin Purvis on his trail, armed with wiretaps, task forces and the new science of federal crime-fighting. As his gang is picked off and the old outlaw world gives way to organized crime, Dillinger’s luck runs out in an alley beside Chicago’s Biograph Theater.
Johnny Depp
Johnny Depp plays John Dillinger, the charismatic Depression-era bank robber who became a folk hero. Depp plays him with a Robin-Hood swagger and genuine tenderness toward Billie — a man living entirely for the present, undone by a modernizing law-enforcement machine he can’t outrun. Depp felt a personal link to the role through his own family’s moonshining past.
Cast & Crew
Cast
John DillingerJohnny Depp
Melvin PurvisChristian Bale
Billie FrechetteMarion Cotillard
J. Edgar HooverBilly Crudup
Homer Van MeterStephen Dorff
Charles WinsteadStephen Lang
Baby Face NelsonStephen Graham
John “Red” HamiltonJason Clarke
Harry PierpontDavid Wenham
Alvin KarpisGiovanni Ribisi
Crew
DirectorMichael Mann
ScreenplayMichael Mann, Ronan Bennett, Ann Biderman
MusicElliot Goldenthal
CinematographyDante Spinotti
ProducersMichael Mann, Kevin Misher
“I’m John Dillinger. I rob banks.”
— John Dillinger, Public Enemies
Filming Locations
- Chicago, Illinois
- Aurora & Joliet, Illinois
- Oshkosh, Milwaukee & Columbus, Wisconsin
- Little Bohemia Lodge, Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin
- Lake County Jail, Crown Point, Indiana
- Biograph Theater alley, Chicago
More about this film
Trivia
- Michael Mann shot the whole film in HD digital (Sony F23) — his first all-digital feature.
- Johnny Depp felt a personal connection to Dillinger; his grandfather ran moonshine and his stepfather had a robbery past.
- Marion Cotillard trained for months in a French-Canadian-Menominee-Wisconsin accent and spoke only English during filming.
- The real 1932 Studebaker Dillinger once used in a robbery was borrowed from a museum for the film.
