Another note about Public Enemies

(now that I’m a bit less tired)

The acting in the movie was pretty good, but the movie was bad in just about every respect. The writing was awful, the structure of the plot was terrible, and the direction and editing were distracting. The movie peaked at least 30 minutes before it ended, leaving all of us thinking: “JUST GO TO THE BIOGRAPH THEATER AND BE DONE WITH IT”. Even Dillinger’s death was drawn-out but offered no pay-off. I really didn’t care what happened to any of the characters.

The camera work and lighting focused a lot on handheld shots (during action scenes) and the lighting was not full, movie-style lighting, but was just “normal” lighting. Instead of feeling like i was watching John Dillinger, I felt like I was watching someone film a movie about John Dillinger. Unfortunately, I was.

QED.