Up

Revisiting UP purely on the basis of its ranking as one of the best PIXAR films, original ideas about the film's weaknesses and likeness to WALL-E were intensified. Like WALL-E, UP begins in wordless, light-music assisted quasi-montage, establishing the protagonist of the film, the cantankerous old Mr. Fredricksen (Ed Anser), as a man who's only grown into the stereotypical 'get off my lawn' archetype. Showing the young Carl as an adventurous but soft-spoken loner, we witness a typical but heartbreaking relationship that he develops with Ellie, a rambunctious neighbor who eventually becomes his wife, after their connection over a blimp named "The Spirit of Adventure", led by a famous explorer who found a wild animal in South America's Paradise Falls. As adults, the Fredricksen's dream of one day saving up the money to make it to Paradise Falls is incessantly interrupted by "life". This is not, however, a clichéd weakness, but, in the vein of many American films, embracing of clichés as something that is, however overused, extremely apparent in many people's lives. Thus, the "life happens" conceit is in fact, the strength of the film, embodied in the wordless sequence that so closely resembles WALL-E's opening. Now alone and wasting away, Mr. Fredricksen's house is threatened by industrialism and vague, sunglass-wearing suits who spy on his house. Finally rejecting society, Fredricksen departs for Paradise Falls with a million balloons that propel his house into the sky. The sequence is breathtaking, and further sets up Fredricksen in a complicated situation. In one sense that the film projects, Fredricksen's departure is a welcome liberation, but it is still mired by his selfishness. Once he discovers a boy scout named Russell clinging to his porch, this is shaken up, and the rest of the film that is good continues this idea, bringing Fredricksen to care for Russell. But then the rest of the film that is bad happens, and, like in WALL-E, silliness trumps storytelling. The film eases us into Paradise Falls, which the duo eventually crash into from out of the clouds: first introducing the mythical creature that was alluded to in the opening sequence: a vibrantly colored, tall, prehistoric bird which becomes attracted to Russell and his chocolate candy bars. Fourth to enter the troupe though, is a talking dog named Doug, who dons Fredricksen as his master, and occasionally becomes distracted by squirrels. But the film downgrades itself, eventually resulting in a Star Wars Rogue Leader spoof with more talking dogs driving airplanes. This silliness would be alright in small doses, but it envelops the entire tail-end of the film, and the eight minute, gorgeous opening sequence has to share its poignancy with dogs with fly airplanes and talk. It's a weak denigration, and feels cheap and lame in its untrustworthiness of children, by thinking that they'll need to be entertained by some silly dogs.

2.5/5 Stars (Uneven--Good)

My Son My Son What Have Ye Done?

MY SON MY SON WHAT HAVE YE DONE? is a film of pure oddity from Werner Herzog. It could almost be seen as Herzog's reaction to "whimsy" in its overuse of completely batshit notions, animals, and characters. The film opens with a cop (Willem Dafoe) arriving at the scene of a murder. He passes by a man, Brad, (Michael Shannon) who mutters to him "razzle dazzle them, razzle dazzle them" and enters the house, seeing a woman with a sword through her. It turns out that the strange man from outside is the murderer, and that the woman inside is his mother. He lives across the street, and starts yelling that he has hostages. In a series of flashbacks, Dafoe's cop interviews the man's fiancé (Chloe Sevigny) and his theater director. After seeing his friends die in a rafting accident after having a premonition about it, the flamingo obsessed Brad returns with the type of grandeur in his motions similar to that of the man he plays in a Sophocles play. With odd detail to Dafoe's interview, which seems more out of pure interest that real, relevant worth, Herzog shows us a descent into insanity that is surrounded by insane notions and gestures. Flamingos, ostrichs, etc. all inhabit the film in the same weird way that Iguanas were intriguing to the cracked-up cop in Herzog's BAD LIEUTENANT. As a serious film, or even one to stand up in Herzog's oeuvre, MY SON MY SON WHAT HAVE YE DONE isn't much. Its insanity, which is the compelling factor of the film, also bogs it down because explanatory sequences can be ostriches. But there's some really great pallid imagery here, which is almost a reason to see the film in itself. Ultimately, the film's pretty fun, and always entertaining.
My Son My Son What Have Ye Done?: ★★★

Daybreakers

Zombie films and infection films that count as zombie films are filled with such a void. They all end in the same way that they began, except that when they end everyone is worse off, but newly educated on some silly parable-like lesson. This is how it is with DAYBREAKERS, a vampire-zombie hybrid movie. Vampires have taken over the world after being infected by bats. Everyone is power is a vampire, and everyone goes about their nightly lives in a similar fashion as to before, except that now, everyone is a vampire. However, the vampires get their power from human blood, and humans are a dying race, existing only in scientific farms or on the run. Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke) is a scientist for one of these farms. He is a reluctant vampire, drinking only animal blood (also on the decline). Because of this open reluctance, Dalton is approached by a few human refugees. Working with the refugees, Dalton seeks a cure, and finds one with a hunter named Elvis (Willem Dafoe). DAYBREAKERS, in between its bloody, murky violence, finds some interesting things to say about corporations, and the evil Charles Bromley (the head of Dalton's human farm and played by Sam Neill) conveys how the vampiric world does not desire a cure, because that would be bad for business. The miscalculation in DAYBREAKERS comes from its desire to juggle gross violence and political half-notions. These half-notions are half-understood, and that makes for a pretty timid movie, filled with characters who just serve as obligatory fillers for a statement or action movie.
Daybreakers: ★1/2

Gamer

An ugly obviousness comes to an ugly film, not to say that filmmakers Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor don't have an enormous amount of talent / style, they do. But in GAMER, their second film in 2009 alone, along with CRANK 2, there's a bluntness within their stylistic ambitions, a proof of bad scriptwritings effect on good filmmakers. Neveldine and Taylor make their movies out of singular images, ones that could be transposed as art pastels on the wall of a museum, filled with texture, composition, and non-focus: seeming to say that in an image is a multitude of experiences, a series of feelings, emotions, true grit. They are fine filmmakers, but this is not a fine film. It is not sound in story, and evokes a headache in trying to comprehend a vice-grip of a perhaps intentionally non-sensical film. The story talks of a series of games where you can pay to essentially control people. This makes video gaming very real, and dangerous, as if you die in the game, you're actually dying in real life. The creator of these games, played by Michael C. Hall sporting a quasi-southern accent, is an eccentric, but clear headed about his goals, vying for his games in the same way that Mark Zuckberg fights for pure community. One of the newer games is a war based shooter, and a young 17 year old controls a prisoner who is fighting to save his life (if he lives past level 30, then he gains his freedom). But the sci-fi is loosely explored, and it makes for an ugly series of headaches, rather than an ugly series within an image. Neveldine and Taylor's talents are better suited for other films, but GAMER is merely a failure, merely a miscalculation.
Gamer: ★★

Breaking Bad (S.2)

Continuing its story with its great premise and great acting, the second season of "Breaking Bad" re-asserted the show's strengths. Splitting its time essentially between chemistry teacher turned meth dealer Walter White and his associate Jesse Pinkman, the second season at nearly double the length of the first allowed for long ruminations of Walter's mindset and the man at heart. Pinkman, the perpetual fuck-up is fleshed out here as a sad case, and one whom we would like to see Walter rescue. Also worthy of a mention, Dean Norris as Walter's brother-in-law Hank Schrader (a D.E.A. agent) is wonderfully humanized in his own arc within season two. In a series of cool and brisk set-ups, the term 'suspenseful' applies to each and every one of the episodes. "Breaking Bad" is a great television show, and this season only solidifies that classification. Despite a finale that is practically bad, 12 other, impeccable, earlier episodes don't deserve to be judged under that singular lens.
Breaking Bad (S.2): ★★★1/2

Valhalla Rising

From Nicholas Winding Refn, director of this year's exemplary DRIVE, came VALHALLA RISING, a tale mired in sometimes unnecessary stylistic gestures, and a quasi-historical starting point. In mountainous, foggy terrain, a hell-like world brews. An unnamed man with one eye is prisoner to a group of apparently nordic men. Some men dress in heavy garments, but this lowly slave is left only a few scraps of clothing. He is watched over and caged, taken around the country as a sort of dogfighting tough. He speaks not a word (a similarity between this feature and DRIVE), but his face is one of charisma, and Refn's direction allows for quick bursts of passionate violence from One-Eye (who is played by Mads Mikkelsen). One-Eye, and a young boy who exclusively has some control over him, eventually free themselves from the slave-owners, and venture out into hell in a series of "parts" specified by Refn. One-Eye and the boy eventually discover a few zealous crusaders (few in number) who lead them to a ghostly ship, which drifts off quite far from the desired destination, Jerusalem, and ends up in the New World. We have all heard stories (and seen movies) of New World discovery, but VALHALLA RISING does it in a unique fashion. One-Eye, our source for solid character, is himself baffled in his attempt to make sense of the New World. He discovers that even his own brand of brawn is not enough, and Refn's direction makes VALHALLA RISING a surprisingly slow, spooky film with a lot of great action. The film has its flaws: Refn is occasionally unwieldy with the cast-over look of his film, and it makes the movie seem "cast-over" just to be cast-over, and not for any real reason. Despite this, VALHALLA RISING is a good film.
Valhalla Rising: ★★★

La Bohéme

A Boring Film with Good Music = A Boring Film

Werner Herzog's short film, LA BOHÉME is, even by a fan of the director's work, not much. The general idea of the film is to show shots of Ethiopian people against one of the more famous arias of the opera: La Bohéme. It is clear that Herzog's vision is to evoke an uncomfortable beauty. Especially for Americans, who thinks of beauty in the form of the people within an Ethiopian tribe? The problem with this statement, however, is that I did not find any beauty within the Ethiopian tribe. Neither, I believe does Herzog. Rather, I think the provocative statement is more attractive to him, and the reality that we find things that are beautiful within our own realm of preferences in truer.
La Bohéme: ★★

The Human Centipede

The opposite of the last entry, IN THE CITY OF SYLVIA, THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE is the cinematic equivalent of smell-o-vision or a video of a sneezing panda on YouTube. It is purely a gimmick, unconcerned with plot, aesthetics, story, or moral. The plot is of no significance because it is a contrivance worthy of creation at a watercooler. Its sole purpose is to put structure around the gimmick in order for it to be sellable. What it actually does is elongate an unworthy gimmick in an unworthy film. This is not cinema, but a juvenile musing of "wouldn't this be cool" translated into a film. The idea of a human centipede, or people connected surgically by a mad doctor from end to end as a form of torture is not only perverse, but, when seen on the screen, pretty stupid looking and unrealistic. What is so funny about this awful film is not its idea or even its plot, but the idea that this was cool or gross, when it actually looks shoddy at best. THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE is unworthy to even be called a film, there should be a name for this kind of thing.
The Human Centipede: Zero Stars

Two Lovers

TWO LOVERS is a brilliant film: a masterpiece by its director James Gray. Gray's images within the film are so eerie and textile, so evocative and persuasive of his vision, that I was lost within it, clamoring at all sides in order to make sense of it, or understand what I was looking at. Gray's spectral masterpiece stars Joaquin Phoenix in a brilliant role that I can only describe as a man living in our century but with the sentimentality of a cowboy. Phoenix appears as if he's sleeping while he's awake sometimes, and always plans out how he wants things to go. He sees his neighbor he has been interested in at the subway station. He pretends to look at a map while moving closer to her so that she will notice him. He's a strange man, quiet and introspective, but then at a nightclub he shines, and then returns to the vastness of the crowd. His lovable parents (Isabella Rossellini & Moni Moshonov) want him to be happy, and set up a practically arranged marriage with fellow dry cleaner owners. The daughter of the fellow dry cleaner owners is not boring though, which most films assign to the role in order to make us side heavily on one side. But Vinessa Shaw as the girl is extremely pretty, interesting, and pleasant. But Phoenix's character Leonard has been going after his neighbor who is into drugs and involved with a married man. She's played by Gwyneth Paltrow in one of her best roles: not showing us that, 'hey I'm Gwyneth Paltrow and let me show you my action side in IRON MAN 2'. Leonard is possibly suicidal, contradicts his nature at strange times, and plays opera music. Gray's images and subtext immerse Phoenix within the unique role, and the film is a wonder to behold.
Two Lovers: ★★★★

Adventureland

Jesse Eisenberg plays his overused, over-mannered character in ADVENTURELAND. He's set to go to Columbia for grad school to become a journalist, but not before he goes on a trip with rich friends to Europe one summer in 1987. However, once his dad is laid off, his family can't afford it, and without the aid of friends to take him on the trip, he ends up in a job for lazy losers at the local theme park. It's name is Adventureland, and it's a shrewd and weird place where you're either in "Games" or in "Rides". Eisenberg's James is told that he definitely belongs in games by the couple who run the park (played hilariously by Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig, work that ranks high above anything they ever did for Saturday Night Live). At the park, James becomes known for having some really good weed, and having lost big fucking panda that you're never supposed to give out for an award, after being held at knifepoint. James meets a group of strange characters that become slowly endearing. One of these characters is Em, who is played wonderfully by the underrated Kristen Stewart. Em and James might end up becoming something, but they're both slightly bitter people. They're definitely appealing and charming throughout the film, but they each have streaks of cruelty that threatens their relationship. ADVENTURELAND suffers from the same common syndrome that runs throughout director Greg Mottola's films. It's an intrinsic flaw that, whenever it is presented, undermines whatever warmth or realness was exhibited previously. Mottola likes to, at the end of his films, wrap up things how they should not be wrapped up, and incessantly allows for nerdy, losers to get the hottest girl around. This is not realistic or interesting, and is indulgent of Mottola and his frequent counterpart and faux-auteur/genius Judd Apatow. However, ADVENTURELAND's earlier scenes make up for most of this stupidity. It's not bad.
Adventureland: ★★1/2

Orphan

Orphan is a terribly effective, tense, and unpredictable horror movie. It has a twist at the end that comes so far out of nowhere, it will surprise and shock every and anyone who sees it. It is beautifully photographed, features scenes where the audience knows what the characters do not, which creates frustration, and it is wonderfully acted. Vera Farmiga and Peter Sarsgaard (two of the best actors around) play the grief stricken parents who have just lost Jessica, who should have been their third child, but was stillborn. In order to "transfer the love they would have shown Jessica to someone who really needs it", the couple adopt Esther, a Russian girl of around 11 or 12 who seems mature and intelligent for her age. However, as time goes by in the household, strange things start to happen around Esther. All of these things are believably rooted in the atmosphere of the movie though, and it creates a wonderful suspense for the audience. Kate (Farmiga's character) becomes dismayed by Esther, but Kate used to be a drinker and she could just be acting out because she's just lost a child, so she can be disregarded. This is the frustration of which I speak, for Esther's motives become quite clear to the audience while the characters within the film are still guessing. One of the great strengths of the film is how it can show us things we really enjoy like the unity of a family, or the tenderness that Farmiga brings to her damaged character, or even the sexiness of the Sarsgaard-Farmiga relationship, and then shatter each and every one of those ideals with the presence of Esther. The film, however, can be comical, sexy, scandalous, sickening, frightful, misleading, and shocking. Orphan is a masterful horror film.
Orphan: ★★★★

The Girl on the Train

The Girl on the Train is a film by André Téchiné, an esteemed French writer/director whose career goes back into the early 70's. Here, he makes a film without any urgency, without any tension. It follows the girl on the train: Jeanne (Émilie Dequenne), who lives her life without any urgency or thought. She's looking for a job, but she doesn't really know anything or have any worthwhile skills. She looks to her mother, Louise (Catherine Deneuve) for help, and Louise sends her to a prolific lawyer who she was close to years ago. The lawyer, Bleistein, is quite successful, jewish, and doesn't see much in Jeanne. Jeanne ends up with a professional wrestler and they house sit for an electronics dealer. It turns out that the guy was into drugs and her boyfriend is stabbed. In anger and confusion, Jeanne fakes a hate crime against herself, and claims that North Africans attacked her for being jewish (although she isn't). This becomes big news and suddenly Jeanne is a little more interesting to everyone (including the jewish lawyer, her mother, and even the French President). So many big things happen here: a stabbing, a lie, idiocy, and yet it is all handled without much life. Like it's main character, the film is in a daze and never really tells us why it's important. Jeanne is just a fuck-up, so why would the film want to parallel to that level of idiocy? Perhaps it makes it authentic, and it allows for questions to well up rather than be posed. This is an interesting and well-acted film, but I fear it was not handled well enough to deserve much praise. I don't regret seeing it and there's a lot to admire in The Girl on the Train, but it needed some urgency, or a driving force throughout.
The Girl on the Train: ★★★1/2

Zombieland

Zombieland begins in a more original and thoughtful way than is expected from a zombie flick. It's funny. We meet Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), a loner who has been making his way through zombie-america because he has a specific set of rules that he follows in order to survive. This is unique, this is funny. The filmmakers then pile on three more characters: a bad-ass zombie killer Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson) and two younger girls with more brawn than you would have expected, played by Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin. Every character here is entertaining and has something unique and amusing about them. The film starts very strong and then unfortunately begins to flounder as it realizes that it has nowhere to go but into clichés given its genre. The end is quite satisfying, and a middle portion with a cameo from Bill Murray is also amusing, but the zombie genre being what it is, the film probably did the best it could. It's a decent film, not great.
Zombieland: ✰✰✰

An Education

From the moment when the streets are colored grey and sad, every house looks the same and uniforms are ubiquitous, An Education is known to be a british movie about the confines of life and trying to break out of those confines. It's immediately apparent that the film is excellent in terms of its technicalities: it's beautifully photographed. So now we expect a film that will follow the formula. And in some ways, An Education does, but it stands out as a different film in two ways. First: it is realistic rather than maudlinly satisfactory, second: it features a breakout performance by a radiant and appropriate Carey Mulligan. The story follows Mulligan's character: Jenny, who is outspoken, intelligent and desires a life where she can study what she wants and listen to what she wants without the protests of her father. But one day, as Jenny walks home with her cello in hand, a charming 'music-lover' saves her and the cello from the wet. He's immediately witty and charming, as radiant as Mulligan's character. Peter Saarsgard (so good, so often) plays the man brilliantly. He strikes up a relationship with Jenny, and in no time is showing her all that she wanted to see. However, there are some demons within this man. Her parents would be happy to see her married off to an established man rather than go after her own life, her teachers are wary but disregarded because they represent the old way of thinking. This is a masterful film. Not only in the way the actors convey feelings at appropriate times, but in the way that the film knows what it's like to be young. It is never condescending or preachy, but you reach a conclusion by what occurred in the story, not what the story told you to think.
An Education: ✰✰✰✰

The Haunting In Connecticut

 This movie blows. There are some effectively scary scenes in it, but upon any sort of further examination, those scenes view as tawdry and a little sick. The story revolves around a family where the son is chronically ill. They move to a house in Connecticut so that they'll be closer to the center where they bring the son. However, in any horror movie, you don't just get a house cheap for no reason. No, Haunting gives it itself away to the biggest movie cliché: the house that is freaky--it was the home to a serial killer. The sick boy starts to experience a ton of psychic dreams: he dreams of the torture that went on at the house. A few ridiculous twists and turns later and the boy is miraculously well again! Haunting in Connecticut gives itself away to nearly every horror movie cliché that exists. The scares are cheap and rely on screechy music and "gotcha!" moments. The film is inept and finally just pretty stupid. It's kind of annoying at times how good it think it is too, so it takes liberties that only a very good horror movie should do. The sadistic nature of the film is what I'm referring to. Your movie should be good if you expect an audience to sit through that kind of bullshit.
The Haunting in Connecticut: ✰✰

The Uninvited

The Uninvited is a problematic, but above-average horror flick. It opens and we meet young Anna, a suicidal teen who is just now being released from the mental hospital. She returns home to her sister Alex and her father, who she learns plans to marry a woman she hates. Not the best environment for a suicidal person to return to...but what the hell, everyone's a little dim in horror movies anyway. Anna (Emily Browning) starts to distrust her father's to-be-bride. She is played well by the talented and underrated Elizabeth Banks. Another fine actor: David Strathairn is the father. Anna's mother is recently dead, killed in a fire, and as Anna digs she begins to convince herself that her to-be-mother-in-law is responsible. We get a lot of obligatory fright scenes then that reduce the power of the film. It's atmospheric enough without requiring such crap, but considering it's hollywood-horror-flick of the fall status, we have to endure some ineffective screechy music mixed with shit jumping out at you. This was all to be expected, but regardless of such silliness, the film is a step above the usual shlock. This was accomplished due to three things: the atmosphere maintained throughout the film, the good acting, and a final twist that changes everything we've just seen. Many twists nowadays just come out of someone's ass, they don't really make sense after you think about it. But in The Uninvited everything from the nuances of who speaks when and what the spook that came out of nowhere is elevated by the finale. It's a good horror movie.
The Uninvited: ✰✰✰

Avatar

Avatar is a difficult film. At times it seems humble and simplistic, and at others it feels pretentious. I suppose the most problematic thing about Avatar is that it pretty much took the story of Pocahontas and then replaced it with aliens. It's obvious what the film is trying to say, and how it compares the two situations. But, the film is so hateful towards humans regarding something we haven't done except in the fantasy world of James Cameron! This bothered me during the first hour of the film, but admittedly, some of the ideas that were brought up in the film were interesting. The idea that a soldier becomes part of the alien tribe and then fights back was appealing to me despite my reservations. The power of the imagery is overwhelming. It's done so well, it creates a world. It reminded me of Star Wars in its epic scale. Every inch of the screen is filled with wonder, the flying scenes, the end result is great. The last scene where the world fights back was appealing. It was well done. And yet...there's a scene in the film where one of the supposedly evil soldiers says something I found true. "You throw a rock in this place and you'll hit some holy fern". Yes! Exactly! That's bullshit! And then, the film goes on to explain the biological interconnectedness of the alien world. But that's bullshit!! That creates a fantasy argument for indigenous peoples, rather than dealing with the issues in a more realistic way. There's also a lot of hippie-scientists who try to be one with the tribe. That's also bullshit. And yet...it's done so well and it's so appealing. Oh Avatar, what to do with you? Perhaps I'm looking at the film too cynically, too literally. Therefore:
Avatar: ★★1/2
(Avatar is a groundbreaking film and one-of-a-kind. It deserves recognition for that but it should be viewed fairly for what it is).

Disgrace

Disgrace is a film that starts so intensely I could hardly believe it. It's at once clear that Disgrace is no murder-case or action type film, not even in the indie version of that. Rather, it begins with sex. This sex is uncomfortable, however, for we have the manipulative and lustful John Malkovich seducing one of his students. They have sex. She tells. Malkovich is outcast immediately. He makes no secret of his affairs, he is at a level above the people he deals with. He believes that he is at such a level of intelligence that they don't even deserve his explanation. Malkovich evokes the image of a devious and sick man. Then the movie shifts gears, and Malkovich is now living in Australia with his lesbian daughter. One day, he is attacked by aborigines. They pour him with gasoline and then light him on fire. He nearly dies, and in his distress, they rape his daughter. Now Malkovich is humbled by absolute evil. He tries to understand, to fight back. But his daughter strangely wants to forget it all. He cannot understand. He is incapable. Disgrace is a film so concerned with this character that it seeps with the power of Malkovich. His character is immediately convincing and we move from listening to a story to analyzing in from within. Disgrace is a complicated and intriguing film. It's about racism and moving on, one of the best films of 2009.
Disgrace: ★★★★

Ponyo

Ponyo isn't meant to be a great film, but it comes from a visionary director: Hayao Miyazaki, and ends up being one. Consider some of his past films: My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away. His animated style is one that produces well-drawn and amiable films. With Ponyo, he achieves just that. It's tale is a little silly, it's just a fable. It tells of a creature named Ponyo that was part of the sea creatures, but longed to be human. It's sort of like the japanese Little Mermaid. Ponyo befriends a boy up on the land, and their innocence and carefree sets them off on a mini-adventure. Everything is so grand in Ponyo, especially a great scene where the duo float over a buried city, that we can't help but feel privileged to see it. It's like a dream. The story, the images, they all seem to have been perfectly re-represented by Miyazaki. The film isn't really complicated or interesting, but it's one of the best children's films I've ever seen. Not only that, but the simplicity within the story is endearing. With all of these high-octane, high-bullshit children's movies that are out nowadays, its so great to see one that tells a simple story and captivates solely by imagery.
Ponyo: ★★★★

Public Enemies

Whenever Michael Mann makes a crime film, there's a hell-of-a-lot for him to live up to. For, in the mid 90's he made one of the best ever: HEAT. With PUBLIC ENEMIES, Mann does not try to give us a great crime movie, but rather, show us one of the most intriguing periods of crime. With PUBLIC ENEMIES we meet and realize the brutality of the likes of: Pretty Boy Floyd (disgustingly killed at the start of the film), Baby Face Nelson, and John Dillinger. The film mostly follows Dillinger, who is played with a smooth face and mean temper by Johnny Depp. Christian Bale plays Melvin Purvis: a hard-ass lawman who'll take criminals dead or alive. We follow the escapades and jail-escapes of Dillinger, and this is all pretty entertaining and interesting, but it is the degeneration of the character's surroundings, and how he reacts to it which is so intriguing. Mann uses striking imagery that never calls attention to itself, and a blunt reaction to violence. This works brilliantly, making PUBLIC ENEMIES a great American film.
Public Enemies: ★★★★