Watch it, if you can stand it.

Rating: 1/10 (16 January 2003)

'Catch Me If You Can' is inspired by the memoirs of Frank Abagnale Jnr so it is suprising that Spielberg shows no interest in Franks' character or the amazing feats/cons he accomplished. Instead of a movie about a remarkable young man we have one about motivation for criminal actions stemming from a broken home and a dishonest father and the particularly unremarkable FBI agent trying to catch him.
There is little description of how he charmed his way through cons as most of the movie is spent giving a completely false impression of his father(and hence him)or showing the plodding Hanratty one step behind him again.
The characters are simplistic, one dimensional and worse dull. In one scene as Hanratty is reporting to his boss his assistant agents loitering at the back of the office are licking ice-creams, they're dopey and outsmarted by Abagnale, WE GET IT ALREADY!
I would like to be able to say I was disillusioned having read Abagnales' book before watching the movie, but I can't. This is one of the worst movies I have ever seen.