This should have been fun. Leonardo DiCaprio as a con man with a gleam
in his eye seemed like a great idea.
What kind of scams would he pull?
How would he outfox people? He’d
use that patented charm we remember from Titanic, that’s how. And how can you beat Tom Hanks in the same
movie? The Oscar-winner would match Leo
in style and wit, and the screen would explode in acting fireworks.
The fireworks must be on back order. Based on the true story of Frank Abagnale,
Jr., and directed by Steven Spielberg, Catch Me if You Can is a
lighthearted waste of time that becomes repetitive and predictable pretty early
on. Frank (DiCaprio) is a bright and
bubbly teenager in New Rochelle, NY in the early 1960s. He idolizes his father (Christopher Walken),
who’s lauded as a local business hero but is really a tax cheat and a minor con
artist. With his family’s finances
beginning to crumble, Frank is forced to transfer from private school to public
school and isn’t too happy with it. In
retaliation he shows up in a classroom and pretends to be the substitute
teacher instead of a student. He pulls
it off for a week, and a new generation of con man is born. When his parents announce their divorce,
Frank runs away from home and starts his new “career.”
He gets a pilot uniform, a typewriter and some
official watermark seals and begins creating phony checks from Pan Am
Airlines. The forgery is so authentic
looking that every bank gives Frank money.
This is fascinating, and captivating viewing. Taking advantage of the almost-celebrity status pilots seemed to
have in the ‘60s, Frank also gets to fly around the country for free, bed every
woman he wants and steal millions of dollars in the process.
But eventually someone was going to find out
that lots of money was missing and that’s where Tom Hanks comes in. He’s a bumbling and tubby FBI agent named
Carl Hanratty who stumbles upon Frank as the thief. It’s around this time that the movie begins to run out of gas. Frank has his criminal technique perfected
by now and the caper gives way to The Fugitive Lite. Hanks is brought in to distract viewers from
the fact that there simply isn’t much story in this movie. The scams aren’t interesting enough, so they
make it a chase movie. Yes, Frank does
other things besides forging Pan Am checks, but it’s a one-trick premise. He gets everything he wants, with seemingly
little effort. Where’s the fun in that?
Catch Me if You Can would have been better
had it not adhered so closely to the truth. It’s a virtual documentary that’s devoid of suspense. This may have been what really happened to
Frank Abagnale, but director Spielberg should have fictionalized more, making
each con a challenge, with the outcome not always obvious. While Abagnale is an intriguing character,
his record alone can’t sustain an A-list big budget movie.
And one has to wonder, if Spielberg is staying
so faithful to the facts, thus giving Abagnale more credibility as a figure,
why was this movie made? Of all the
biographies that could be done by the man who immortalized Schindler, why
choose this guy? Think less about who
Abagnale is and more about what he represents.
He’s a sexy, lovable con man who gets away with it. This movie isn’t harsh, it isn’t critical,
it’s lighthearted and breezy. Spielberg
is betting that Abagnale is a guy everyone wants to be like. So he stole -- big deal. It’s only money, it’s not like he killed
anyone ... where does that Pan Am money come from anyway? Airlines have plenty of funds, just as Enron
does. In hard economic times people
would love to pull off Frank’s scams and get free money. He’s a hero like Schindler, just a different
kind.
Schindler’s List, though, was a
dramatic triumph with a story that didn’t need to be massaged. Tom Hanks isn’t needed here but more
Leonardo DiCaprio is. We never really
understand why Frank does what he does.
He cons his way into substitute teaching at 16 and now the sky’s the
limit? Parents get divorced everyday;
is that a reason to become a mastermind?
If there’s anything Catch Me if You Can succeeds
at, it’s how it makes one wish for perfect vision. Being a pilot sure looks like fun.
Copyright 2002 Arthur Swift. Originally published December 28, 2002.