CATCH ME IF YOU CAN (2002)

"A return to form for both actor and director."

- Carl Lazarevic

(4/5 Stars)

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I must admit that I went into this movie with extremely low expectations. The trailer just looked so quaint and it appeared that DiCaprio had decided to stay in the pretty boy roles that he has been famous for lately. My suspicions weren't helped when the opening credits kicked in and they were done in the style of an 80's comedy like Mannequin or Honey I shrunk The Kids. Any hopes I had for the film were then virtually shattered by an opening scene taking place on a quiz show after the events of the film. A scene which seemed to have a single purpose and that was to give me a scene for scene description of what I was about to watch. Well thankfully this film is able to prove that first, second, and even third impressions are not always correct.

It's just that pairing Steven Spielberg's directing talents and DiCaprio's acting talents is a recipe for success. Both of them have now been returned to their appropriate places among the top of their respective fields. DiCaprio proved himself to be maturing as an actor in his other film this month Gangs Of New York but it is here in this film that he has managed to give one of his best performance's yet. On the surface Frank W. Abagnale seems to be just another token DiCaprio pretty boy, but if you look under the surface you will find a much more complex character. He may seem like nothing more than a flirt who is impressing the pretty girls but Frank is a character with a lot of emotional issues bubbling away under the surface. This is the beauty of DiCaprio's performance because while most actors would either ignore these issues and enjoy the flirting, or still other actors would go to the other extreme and drag the film down into a pit of forced emotion, DiCaprio is different. He tries and succeeds to portray a character portraying a pretty boy. He manages to show the flirty side of Frank yet also show his emotions with a particular look. These traits become more and more evident as the film moves on and I'm not really sure that many actors as young as DiCaprio would have been able to pull it off.

DiCaprio though isn't expected to hold the film alone because like I said it is his pairing with Spielberg that is so inspired. In this film Spielberg has managed to make a fun, light hearted caper with real emotion. I mean the problem with a lot of his more recent work has been due to the fact that he has taken on dark and gritty themes despite the fact that he himself is such an optimistic director. The happy endings portrayed in AI and Minority Report just felt wrong in the context of the films and ended up spoiling what the films had set up, but in Catch Me If You can he has managed to get the tone just right. It's when the body of the film starts that the films opening credits start to make sense. The little cartoon characters that were running around in such a carefree way perfectly set the tone for a film that is set firmly in the style of the 60's. The colorful fashions and the fast music just succeed in giving the film that light hearted tone that most people seem to remember the 60's for. It succeeds because this lightheartedness is what makes you root for the character and allows for Spielberg's token optimism to fit into the story in a satisfactory way.

Unfortunately the film is not without it's Achilles heal, and this comes in the form of the FBI. Tom Hanks is an actor that I have a great deal of respect for but in this film he has failed to deliver anything spectacular. I wouldn't call him bad because there was a definite chemistry between him and DiCaprio, it's just his performance lacked substance. He failed to really put across the frustrations that his character felt at losing a little of his reputation every time DiCaprio slipped his grasp. It's a shame because the character was very well written with such elements as him being a semi father figure to Frank, or the loss of his own family to divorce. There was a lot going for this character and I felt that Hanks performance failed to deliver it, reducing the character to just another "gotta catch my man" style cop. Of course this wasn't helped by his partner's. One was a virtually non existent role, and the other was a bumbling side kick. After the free flowing comedy that was produced naturally during DiCaprio's scenes seeing a fat cop cautiously reach for a fork just seems a little to forced. It's a major shame because the scenes between the FBI agents really started to drag badly in places and are the reason that the film failed to achieve a full 5 stars.