Public Enemies (2009) on Netflix
R20092h 20mBiographyCrimeDrama
Bank robber John Dillinger robs banks around Chicago in 1933 while FBI agent Melvin Purvis leads the hunt. J. Edgar Hoover makes Dillinger the country's first Public Enemy Number One.
- Netflix3.5/5
- IMDb6.9/10337,203 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes68%
Trailer
Plot summary
Depression-era Chicago gives John Dillinger room to rob banks with a crew that includes Red Hamilton, Homer Van Meter and Harry Pierpont, and he moves through the city with little fear of the authorities. J. Edgar Hoover, building the young FBI, makes Dillinger his first Public Enemy Number One and gives the manhunt to agent Melvin Purvis, who adopts fingerprint files and tapped telephone lines and brings in intelligence officer Charles Winstead for the hardened killers. Dillinger meets Billie Frechette, a coat check girl and singer, and the two become inseparable while Baby Face Nelson and the rest of the gang keep robbing banks.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Public Enemies (2009)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Johnny Depp could not find a recording of John Dillinger's own voice, but did find recordings of Dillinger's father; Depp, who was born in Owensboro, Kentucky, about 70 miles from where Dillinger was born, said that hearing them was when "it all clicked" and he knew how Dillinger moved and talked.
- Marion Cotillard was cast as Billie Frechette after her film Nine was postponed; multiple American actresses also wanted the part, but Michael Mann found Cotillard "focused and artistically ambitious".
- The rights were sold to production companies representing Michael Mann and Leonardo DiCaprio, who was interested in playing John Dillinger himself; DiCaprio eventually left the project to appear in Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island.
- The actual 1932 Studebaker that John Dillinger used during a robbery in Greencastle, Indiana was borrowed from the nearby Historic Auto Attractions museum and used during filming in Columbus.
- The crew filmed at the Little Bohemia Lodge in Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin, the actual location of a 1934 gun fight between Dillinger and the FBI, and in Crown Point, Indiana, the town where Dillinger was imprisoned and escaped from jail.
- Michael Mann said the real Dillinger took 17 officers hostage with the wooden gun he had carved when he escaped from Crown Point, but the film shows six or seven because the true number "wouldn't be credible if you put it in a movie".
