Christian Bale on Depp/Dillinger trail in “Public Enemies”

Christian Bale is reportedly in talks to join Johnny Depp in director Michael Mann’s Depression-era crime drama, “Public Enemies,”.

The Batman Begins hunk would take on the role of Melvin Purvis, who led the FBI’s manhunt for Dillinger and captured more public enemies than any other agent in FBI history. It was Purvis who uttered, “Stick ‘em up, Johnny” when he confronted Dillinger outside Chicago’s Biograph Theatre in 1934, moments before the gangster was shot dead by FBI agents. Ben Johnson played Purvis in the 1973 movie “Dillinger.”

The Universal Pictures project follows the government’s attempt to capture notorious criminals John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson and Pretty Boy Floyd. Depp is set to play Dillinger of course.  The script is an adaptation of Bryan Burrough’s book “Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-43.”

Production is scheduled to begin later this winter in Chicago and other Midwest locales.
Both Depp and Bale have had an excellent run in the last few years. After last summer’s Pirates threequel, Johnny Depp can be seen and heard singing in Tim Burton’s much hyped Sweeney Todd, co-starring with Helena Bonham Carter, while Bale has recently had two major releases: western remake 3:10 to Yuma, opposite Russell Crowe, and Todd Haynes’ Bob Dylan biopic I’m Not There. Bale is currently set to play John Connor in the fourth “Terminator movie, “Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins,” which will follow “Enemies.” Bale will next appear in theatres this summer’s Batman movie, “The Dark Knight.”

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