Last night I saw a film that I really enjoyed while I was watching, but right now, I am very angry. I had been wanting to see Michael Mann's "Public Enemies", about the life and exploits of Depression-era gangster John Dillinger, for quite some time. The cast is top notch, featuring the likes of Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Marion Cotilliard, Giovanni Ribisi and Billy Crudup. The film was well-constructed and edited, with brilliant set pieces and authentic locations. Mann's direction, particularly in the violent gun battles, was as inspired as his work on "Collateral" or "Heat".

Now, I hate this movie.

I hate this movie for making up a whole bunch of stuff and presenting it as if it were fact. I understand through my filmic knowledge that when Bruce Willis jumps from on top of a semi-trailer to the wing of jet fighter that what I'm watching is less about a realistic depiction of incredible balance and foresight and more about cheering on the champ fighting impossible odds and dastardly deeds (for the fourth time, because we liked the last three so much). I also know why major film studios (and they are by no means the only culprits) feel it is okay to amalgamate several real life people into single characters, omit or compress events into a filmable timeline or often to use historical figures in otherwise fictional accounts - it is because of the constraints of the medium; time, budget, audience interest, box office.

I am aware, and can accept, that studio movies take creative licence when presenting stories "inspired by actual events". I believe that from time to time films can spark debate about the objectivity of narration, the privileged point of view of the protagonist and the moral skew of personal accounts in their depiction. This particular subject is close to my heart, as it formed the basis of my Honours thesis some years ago. The argument presented in my thesis was that films such as "Schindler's List" and "JFK" should be considered post-modern history texts and were worthy of wider cultural dissemination and debate, challenging the lofty position held by the greying concept of 'the history book'. I had, at the time, read many scholarly articles decrying "Schindler's List" as 'unrepresentative' of the Holocaust because the central character was a sympathetic German, and in a very post-modern way I argued that the film was as worthy of study as any history book on the school curriculum because of the nature of objectivity, and that the seemingly untouchable status of the printed word was being challenged by the possibilities made available by popular films.

This is an argument I stand by today, and I still believe that the depiction cannot be considered 'unrepresentative' purely because it centres on a German industrialist, instead of one of the millions of Jewish prisoners who died in Nazi concentration camps. The film presents a remarkable and defiant character, flawed as he was, because it asks the audience about the nature of virtue in the face of tyranny; that good versus evil is not just a Hollywood construct. Similarly, "JFK" presented an unpopular theory as fact, going against the conventional wisdom to portray a series of events following the death of the US President not as the suppostion of an over-reaching New Orleans DA, but a dramtic re-enactment of events as if they were corroborated fact. This subversive approach, very much the fingerprint of it's director Oliver Stone, made the film a point of heated discussion in public forums, causing the re-examination of several aspects of the case. In terms of film as social motivator for change, "JFK" is as important as any official document released on the subject and should be considered just as credible; the theories contained therein are no more "pie in the sky" than some of those reprinted in history books as 'fact', including the dubious conclusions drawn by the Warren Report, the official investigation into the assassination.

Having defended these two films against what I considered stuffy old professors and scholars desperate to preserve the sanctity of the history text in it's written form, I am prepared to cross to the other side in order to criticise Michael Mann's inaccurate and disingenuous depiction of the famed period of Dillinger's life when he was tagged 'Public Enemy Number One" by the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover. Towards the end of the film, Dillinger (played charmingly by Depp) wanders into the office of the Dillinger Squad at the Chicago Police Department, an unusual, but characteristically cocky thing to do. While this event didn't happen exactly as depicted, it is based on a similar even earlier in Dillinger's infamous career. Perhaps I would be happy to let this slight blurring of reality through to the keeper if it wasn't for so many other complete fabrications; the order in which Dillinger's gang died (most of them outlived him by at least a few months), Agent Purvis was not present when 'Baby Face' Nelson died (and therefore was not the man who shot him) nor had he even met Dillinger before before their paths crossed in front of the Biograph theatre. Dillinger was shot in the head and did not have any last words (sorry if you consider that a spolier, if you were unaware that Dillinger died, or that the Titanic sunk, perhaps you're reading the wrong blog). These are completely artistic fabrications that I believe were unnecessary changes from accepted history, and that knowing that these events did not happen as presented weakens the validity of the film.

If, for example, Brian De Palma decides that 'The Untouchable' Eliot Ness should throw ruthless crime boss Frank 'The Enforcer' Nitti off a courthouse roof as shown in "The Untouchables", perhaps he is making a fictional story. Nitti shot himself sitting in a railyard, which does not give Kevin Costner the heroic gravitas needed to end the picture with good triumphing over evil. Nor does it give us, the bloodthirsty audience, it's vicarious revenge for the killing of Sean Connery. Nobody kills Sean Connery and gets away with it; the man was James Bond for crying out loud. I can only asume there is a point where defamation is no longer a consideration, when a person's deeds move directly past history as fact into the realm of folklore. Eliot Ness was depicted as a murderer in the film, but in a good way, so I guess there's no need to sue over that.

While I'm ranting off topic, how come everyone had cool nicknames in the 30's? I don't know anyone called 'creepy', 'baby face' or 'pretty boy'. Perhaps that was what people did for fun in the olden days.

So, I guess what I am asking is this; who decides what parts of the story can be tampered with and which parts are 'sacred'? Ultimately, I believe the director of the film has this duty, and should be entrusted to present a movie that trades on being based on actual events with as much of the evidential knowledge as possible. Did Michael Mann fail in this duty? You're damn tootin'. What exactly is the point of calling the character the name of the real person if you are going to obscure the facts of their life and death? It is because history loans the film a sense of importance that it can't necessarily generate on it's own. But after the film has deemed itself 'important' and you've paid to see it, who gives a cracker who actually shot who?

Oh, and another film I saw recently, "Bottle Shock", gets a mention here because not only does it play around with the facts surrounding the famous 'Judgement of Paris' in 1976, pitting USA wines against their French counterparts, but it is also a bad, bad movie. So I guess "Public Enemies" has it's plus side.