cops & robbers: first impression
Also, read Stephanie Zacharek's very nice review at Salon; and definitely, definitely be sure to read Mary Anne Johnson's review at FlickFilosopher, since she says what I wanted to say, but more of it and better.
Went to see Public Enemies last night with naeelah; it didn't totally succeed, but it was pretty good. I'm not a crazed Mann fangirl, but he tends to make movies I like, and I tend to like his movies, and this can be slotted in there with Manhunter, Heat, and Miami Vice (movie) as another of his crime stories I like, and with The Last of the Mohicans as another (the other?) historical/costume drama of his I like.
It's tense and moody and there are action scenes (Mann does likes his wall-to-wall shoot-outs), but mostly it's just restrained. I don't think it's accurate to say it's another style-over-substance Mann movie, because I do think it was very good and well done over all, ... but I do wish there'd been a little more more in it. More historical grounding maybe? A little more character interaction. I don't know. It is, however, very much a Mann movie. I don't know how much of that wanting more whatever to put down to the fact that it's kind of spare, and there's simply not a lot of dialogue. It's not boring, though. Just don't go in expecting Scarface, because this is not remotely that movie.
He shot it in HD (with Dante Spinotti as cinematographer) and you can tell. Stylistically, it's a lot like MV in being kind of hyper-immediate/realistic. It's a period piece that doesn't feel or look like your conventional period piece, but instead has a pretty intimate, embedded/live documentary feel to it pieces of it.
some random thoughts:
[1] The eavesdropping scenes in the old-fashioned telephone relay room are pretty nifty.
[2] I spent a good chunk of the movie trying to remember where I'd seen Stephen Lang (Winstead the smart, super-blue-eyed, laconic older cop) before and finally remembered he was Ike Clanton in Tombstone. (He's in Manhunter, too, but I imprinted on Tombstone first.)
[3] For my money, probably the tensest sequence -- is a seventy-year-old historical event a spoiler? -- is the Crown Point jail break, where Dillinger and fellow inmate Youngblood break out with a wooden gun, bluffing their way through locked door after locked door, and then drive off in the sheriff's personal car through town with police and the National Guard literally on the sidewalk and every corner.
In closing, the '30s costumes are great [HQ pictures], and particularly great in that they manage to look not like "costumes," but wear like everyday clothes. So yay to the always reliable Colleen Atwood. Plus, they're just nice. We spent a lot of the movie going "why don't men dress like that anymore?" to each other. And, yes, Depp and Bale wear them very well. I mean, hot damn. If everything else in this had gone wrong, it would still have been worth it just to look at them, and look at them in those lovely suits.
So, anyway, Laura and Kim, if you don't get around to seeing it any time soon, I'll totally go with you to see it.
Went to see Public Enemies last night with naeelah; it didn't totally succeed, but it was pretty good. I'm not a crazed Mann fangirl, but he tends to make movies I like, and I tend to like his movies, and this can be slotted in there with Manhunter, Heat, and Miami Vice (movie) as another of his crime stories I like, and with The Last of the Mohicans as another (the other?) historical/costume drama of his I like.
It's tense and moody and there are action scenes (Mann does likes his wall-to-wall shoot-outs), but mostly it's just restrained. I don't think it's accurate to say it's another style-over-substance Mann movie, because I do think it was very good and well done over all, ... but I do wish there'd been a little more more in it. More historical grounding maybe? A little more character interaction. I don't know. It is, however, very much a Mann movie. I don't know how much of that wanting more whatever to put down to the fact that it's kind of spare, and there's simply not a lot of dialogue. It's not boring, though. Just don't go in expecting Scarface, because this is not remotely that movie.
He shot it in HD (with Dante Spinotti as cinematographer) and you can tell. Stylistically, it's a lot like MV in being kind of hyper-immediate/realistic. It's a period piece that doesn't feel or look like your conventional period piece, but instead has a pretty intimate, embedded/live documentary feel to it pieces of it.
some random thoughts:
[1] The eavesdropping scenes in the old-fashioned telephone relay room are pretty nifty.
[2] I spent a good chunk of the movie trying to remember where I'd seen Stephen Lang (Winstead the smart, super-blue-eyed, laconic older cop) before and finally remembered he was Ike Clanton in Tombstone. (He's in Manhunter, too, but I imprinted on Tombstone first.)
[3] For my money, probably the tensest sequence -- is a seventy-year-old historical event a spoiler? -- is the Crown Point jail break, where Dillinger and fellow inmate Youngblood break out with a wooden gun, bluffing their way through locked door after locked door, and then drive off in the sheriff's personal car through town with police and the National Guard literally on the sidewalk and every corner.
In closing, the '30s costumes are great [HQ pictures], and particularly great in that they manage to look not like "costumes," but wear like everyday clothes. So yay to the always reliable Colleen Atwood. Plus, they're just nice. We spent a lot of the movie going "why don't men dress like that anymore?" to each other. And, yes, Depp and Bale wear them very well. I mean, hot damn. If everything else in this had gone wrong, it would still have been worth it just to look at them, and look at them in those lovely suits.
So, anyway, Laura and Kim, if you don't get around to seeing it any time soon, I'll totally go with you to see it.