Depp says he felt an instant connection to Dillinger, the bold-yet-humble bank robber who lived in old films that Depp watched for hours on his family's black-and-white, rabbit-eared TV.
That was in Florida, where his parents ultimately moved and split up. Young Depp was enthralled with Dillinger as well as such silent-film stars as Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. Even today, contemporary movies can put him to sleep by the title sequence, but when he sees the old Warner Bros. logos, his heart soars. "I guess the era got me, the '30s, '40s and even the '20s. I was fascinated with the old Bogey movies, with Cagney movies, or even Fred Astaire."
Undeniably, Dillinger the myth remains bigger than Dillinger the man, even though "Public Enemies" is based on Bryan Burrough's nonfiction book about the gangster.
"The title of the film is 'Public Enemies,' but I don't see John Dillinger as an enemy of the public," adds Depp. He points out that Dillinger's prime antagonist, J. Edgar Hoover, wreaked more havoc and misery during his 40-year tenure atop the FBI than Dillinger did during his 18-month crime spree. "I mean, who's the real criminal?" Depp asks. The movie is "bloody and brutal," but it takes place during the height of the Depression, during a wave of foreclosures and bank failures. "People at certain points just had to take up arms, did they not?"
Still, even in these troubled economic times, it's hard to imagine the public romanticizing the illegal activities of a similar outlaw figure. Most people today are craving stability and order, not more chaos. But for Depp, the real difference is the corrosive media attention.
"Today, if there was a Robin Hood-type guy out there -- we are in an age where we sell our privacy to television. Everyone out there has a camera, and a cellphone, and a BlackBerry, and in less then 10 seconds it's on the Internet. So he would have been sold out just like that today," he says, snapping his fingers.
Depp, like most actors, has his issues with the media; reports of purported friction between Mann, known for his maniacal attention to detail, and Depp have been well publicized over the past months. Today, Depp says it was all part of the process.
"He's intense, and as long as you sort of walk into the ring ready for that, it's all fine," Depp explains, noting that Mann "is painting the picture, and that's the one thing that takes a bit of getting used to. I'm definitely not good at just being a color on the palette, you know."
