Catch Me If You Can

B

Steven Spielberg says that he likes to do movies in pairs. ET with Close Encounters, Schindler's List with Amistad, A.I. with Minority Report. This, he says, is to make sure he gets to broaden his craft. So fresh after Minority Reports, he was in the mood of something light, "a dessert". Catch Me If You Can is just like that. This and its follow-up brother The Terminal are Spielberg's "bon bons".

Catch Me If You Can follows the life of Frank Abagnale Jr, a forger of bank checks and impersonator, who before the age of 17 have cashed 4 million dollars worth of checks, become an airline co-pilor, doctor and assistant DA in Luisiana in the 1960s. After a brief prologue, we are introduced to the 15-year-old Frank Jr (Leonardo Dicaprio). His father (Christopher Walken) is being investgated by the IRS, and eventually the family had to give up their well-to-do suburban lifestyle. Frank Jr's idealized view of a family completely breaks apart when his parents divorced. He ran away from home, and learnt the craft of check forgery. FBI Agent Carl Hanratti (Tom Hanks) started noticing this "paperhanger" and pursued Frank. Over the next 5 years, Frank moved from one escapade to another, with Hanratti right behind, trying to catch him, if he can.

Despite the high anticipation for the unification of Spielberg's 2nd collaboration with Hanks, with a plot that sounded enticingly fresh, Catch Me If You Can is not that kind of movie. In fact, to enjoy this movie, one should have no expectations or preconceptions of the movie or its plot. This probably has something to do with Spielberg's reliable inclination to be wholesome, and sometimes too wholesome. Catch Me If You Can is rich in looks and atmosphere as much as it is with its story, but since one cannot be everything all at once, the movie becomes overstudded and hence edgeless. I watched it the first time 4 years ago, and I walked out the cinema unsure of any significance of what I just watched.

Catch Me If You Can looks great. It used colours and props to show the 1960s and created a visual style of its own. Frank Jr was standing outside a hotel lobby when a cab pulled over carrying an airline pilot with stewardesses, bathed in golden rays. There was emphasis on Frank's idealized family life, where time and time again we see Frank looking longingly at homes who are loving and warm.

Performances wise, there was nothing stand-out. Tom Hanks essayed the role of Hanratti effortlessly, a dedicated FBI man who shows became a mentor/friend to Frank even while they were on the opposite sides of the law. Leonardo Dicaprio was acceptable as Frank Jr, though he did look too old to be a teenager. One wonders if getting a real teenager to play Frank might be an oscar vehicle.

As far as a 2-plus-hour entertainment goes, Catch Me If You Can is above most things out there. But it is an example how Spielberg, wanting to be everything to everyone, became his own enemy (he would again do the same for The Terminal). Catch Me If You Can wouldn't have been a better movie, but at least it could have been made more memorable, and not just a sweet bon bon.
~

To Catch A Thief

B-

Despite an interesting premise about a thief trying to catch another thief, and despite coming right after the brilliance of Rear Window, Hitchcock's To Catch A Thief disappoints. To be fair, I knew from the start that this wasn't to be in the same league as Rear Window or North By Northwest, but even with some of the auteur's signature brushes, To Catch A Thief is a mediocre movie by any standards.

It takes one to know one. John Robie (Cary Grant) is a retired and reformed jewel thief who was once infamously known as The Cat. A string of new burglaries in France, however, has led the police to see him as the prime suspect. His old comrades too think he did it. As such, to clear his name, he vows to catch the impostor as he's the only one who can. In anticipation of the next burglary, Robie became acquainted with heiress Jessie Stevens (Jessie Royce Landis) and her pampered daughter Jessie (Grace Kelly), who eventually falls for him. He realizes that he's playing a gamble, because if the Steven's gems get stolen, he'll be into a deep rut for sure.

The problem with To Catch A Thief is the plot. Throughout the film, it felt like a half-baked movie, where it could have gone either way - romance or thriller. Hitchcock and screenwriter John Michael Hayes failed to incorporate these 2 major aspects to work together (Rear Window showed that such an endeavour is possible), and here, unfortunately, they steal the focus off each other. One has a sense that Hitchcock realized the central theme about catching a thief is thin beyond measure, and hence he tried to clog up the screen time by injecting a romance story. It didn't work.

Cary Grant's performance in this movie lacked energy. I thought he was fine in North By Northwest, but John Robie came across as bland with him. There were a number of times when watching the movie that I left uncomfortable seeing Grant's aloofness made an already thin and unexciting plot seem even more lacklustre. Likewise, Grace Kelly turned in a much more solid performance in Rear Window than here. Francie never developed into a real woman. We see little pieces of a real character, but never the whole person. Jessie Royce Landis showed a much more memorable prowess as Fraces' mother, though her role is minimal. Most other supporting characters are only on screen long enough that one confuses them for others.

Dialogue in To Catch A Thief sparkles with the usual Hitchcock flair and wit. But compared to his masterpieces, To Catch A Thief is an insult. Though, of course, it's not that bad, but it is disappointing that the auteur is capable of mediocrity.
~