Dillinger (1973 film)

Dillinger

Promotional poster
Directed by John Milius
Produced by Samuel Z. Arkoff
Lawrence Gordon
Buzz Feitshans
Robert Papazian
Written by John Milius
Starring Warren Oates
Ben Johnson
Michelle Phillips
Harry Dean Stanton
Geoffrey Lewis
John P. Ryan
Richard Dreyfuss
Steve Kanaly
Cloris Leachman
Music by Barry De Vorzon
Cinematography Jules Brenner
Edited by Fred R. Feitshans Jr.
Distributed by American International Pictures (1973, original), MGM (2003, DVD), Arrow Video (under license from MGM) (2016, Blu-Ray)
Release dates
  • July 20, 1973 (1973-07-20)
Running time
 107 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $1 million[1]
Box office $2 million (US and Canada rentals)[2]

Dillinger is a 1973 gangster film about the life and criminal exploits of notorious bank robber John Dillinger.

It stars Warren Oates as Dillinger and Ben Johnson as his pursuer, FBI Agent Melvin Purvis. It contains the first film performance by the singer Michelle Phillips as Dillinger's moll Billie Frechette. The film, narrated by Purvis, chronicles the last few years of Dillinger's life (depicted as a matter of months) as the FBI and law enforcement closed in. The setting is Depression era America, 1933-34.

The film features largely unromanticized depictions of the principal characters. It was written and directed by John Milius for Samuel Z. Arkoff's American International Pictures.

Retired FBI Agent Clarence Hurt, one of the agents involved in the final shootout with Dillinger, was the film's technical advisor. The film includes documentary imagery and film footage from the era. It includes a verbal renouncing of gangster films written by FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover: he was scheduled to read it, but died before the film's release. The written words of Hoover are read at the film's close by Paul Frees.

The film was followed by two made-for-TV spin-offs: Melvin Purvis: G-Man (1974) (teleplay written by Milius) and The Kansas City Massacre (1975), both directed by Dan Curtis and each starring Dale Robertson as Purvis.

Cast

Production

In the early 1970s, John Milius was one of the most sought after screenwriters in Hollywood, selling his scripts for Jeremiah Johnson and The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean for record sums. He was unhappy with the way both films turned out, however and wanted to turn director. Samuel Z. Arkoff said that AIP approached him with the offer to direct Dillinger if he would write the script "for a fraction of his usual price."[3]

The project was announced in April 1972.[4]

"My father always predicted I would wind up in San Quentin by the age of 21," said Milius. "I wouldn't want to disappoint him too much. So here I am... directing a film about John Dillinger, the greatest criminal that ever lived."[5]

Milius cast Warren Oates in the lead. Milius had wanted Oates to play the lead role in The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. "I write all my things for Warren Oates or young John Wayne types," he said. "Or sometimes Clint Eastwood. He looks good holding a gun. But to me John Wayne is the ultimate American hero. Not because he's big and tough but because he's sentimental. My pictures are sentimental, idealistic. I deal with values of friendliness and courtliness and the family and chivalry and honour and courage - not just guts but bigger than life courage. Nobody today writes movies in the style that I do. Nobody. I write characters that are strong and direct, superindividuals. The people in my movies fear no one but God."[5]

Milius says he wanted to make a movie about Dillinger because "of all the outlaws, he was the most marvellous".[6] He elaborated:

People admired and respected Dillinger for being the greatest criminal. They admired him because he could get away with it. Because he did it well and he did it with style. And also because he enjoyed his work. I've made a myth out of him but not a romantic myth like Bonnie and Clyde. Dillinger is a tough guy he's a Cagney. I'm not at all concerned with showing his early life or explaining how he got that way. What I'm interested in is the legend. That's what this movie is, that's exactly what it is. It's not a character study or a Freudian analysis; it's an American folk tale[5]

Michelle Phillips claimed she got cast by pretending to be half Cherokee, like her character.[7]

Shooting

Filming took place in late 1972. Dillinger was filmed in its entirety in Oklahoma with some onsite filming taking place in Milwaukee and southeastern Wisconsin.[8] Much use of various local landmark buildings were used in the filming from Jet, Nash, Jefferson, and Enid, Oklahoma in the North, to Ardmore, the Chickasaw Country Club and the old iron truss bridge near Mannsville, Oklahoma in the South, the Skirvin Tower ballroom, and the Midwest Theater in Oklahoma City, filling in as the Biograph.

Many local would-be actors wound up immortalized on film, such as the warden of the prison, who was in real life, an Enid, Oklahoma postman.

"It's my first time as director and I think I did an excellent job because I had such a superb script," said Milius.[5]

Reception

Milius later said in 2003:

I look at it today and I find it very crude, but I do find it immensely ambitious. We didn't have a lot of money, or time, and we didn't have such things – we only had so many feet of track, stuff like that. So I couldn't do moving shots if they involved more than, what, six yards of track. We never had any kind of crane or anything. That's the way movies were made then.[9]

Fiction vs Facts

Reception

By 1976 Variety estimated the film had earned $4 million in rentals.[10]

DVD

Dillinger was released to DVD by MGM Home Video on August 12, 2003 as a Region 1 widescreen DVD and by Arrow Video (under license from MGM) on April 26, 2016 as a Region 1 widescreen Blu-ray & DVD combo pack.

See also

References

  1. ↑ A Million-Dollar 'Dillinger' by AIP Haber, Joyce. Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) [Los Angeles, Calif] 13 June 1973: g18
  2. ↑ 'Big Rental Films of 1973', Variety, 9 Jan 1974 p19
  3. ↑ The dime-store way to make movies-and money By Aljean Harmetz. New York Times (1923-Current file) [New York, N.Y] 04 Aug 1974: 202.
  4. ↑ Murphy, M. (1972, Apr 14). CALL SHEET. Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/156924730
  5. 1 2 3 4 Norma, L. B. (1973, Jan 28). Movies. Chicago Tribune (1963-Current File) Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/170336444
  6. ↑ Segaloff, Nat, "John Milius: The Good Fights", Backstory 4: Interviews with Screenwriters of the 1970s and 1980s, Ed. Patrick McGilligan, Uni of California 2006 p 290
  7. ↑ Mann, R. (1978, Apr 02). Michelle phillips: She's got high hopes. Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/158579408
  8. ↑ Gilpatrick Halverson, Kristin (2002). Famous Wisconsin Film Stars. Oregon, WI: Badger Books, Inc. p. 322. ISBN 1-878569-86-4. "Dillinger (1973) was partly filmed in Milwaukee and southeastern Wisconsin
  9. ↑ Ken Plume, "Interview with John Milius", IGN, 7 May 2003 accessed 5 January 2013
  10. ↑ "All-time Film Rental Champs", Variety, 7 January 1976 p 50

External links

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