Of Mice and Yankees

Rating: Null/10 (28 December 2002)

"Catch Me if You Can" is an acceptable, feel-good movie involving characters we want to succeed, Leonardo DiCaprio as Frank Abragnale Jr, and Tom Hanks as FBI agent, Carl Handratty. Guns are drawn but never fired and a disillusioned son never gets to express his outrage at his opportunistic mother. Steven Spielberg injects the 1960s look of a Robert Wagner 'It Takes a Thief' TV series or a Peter Sellers 'Pink Panther', even bringing back Kitty Carlisle for the 'To Tell The Truth' show. But he doesn't give us the inventive nor provocative spirit of his trademark films. De Caprio excels in his very believable conversion, from a bystander witnessing his father dangling lockets or overly praising strange women to do his biding or his mother's philandering, to an active participant in fraud. Tom Hanks has to suffer the role of the fall guy, failing at least four times to catch his man. The interesting women in De Caprio's life, especially the hotel hooker (Jennifer Garner) who fails to appreciate a con and the sheepish young nurse (Amy Adams) whose genuineness is as clear as the braces on her teeth make for interesting distractions but their roles are too transitory.
This is an OK film but, by Spielberg standards, below what was expected.