What a great movie

Rating: 10/10 (19 March 2011)

WARNING THIS REVIEW INCLUDES A SPOILER Catch Me If You Can is inspired by the young teenage con artist and master of deception Frank Abagnale Jr. played by actor Leonard DiCaprio. This movie is about the relentless pursuit of Frank Jr. by FBI agent Carl Hanratty played by actor Tom Hanks. The movie starts out by showing sixteen year old Frank Jr. living a good life with his father Frank Sr. played by actor Christopher Walken and his mother Paula played by actress Nathalie Baye. The family runs into some financial issues because Frank Sr. owed the IRS money. Due to the financial issues the family had to move out of their house to an apartment. Paula cannot deal with all of the changes and begins having an affair with one of Frank's close friends played by James Brolin. Frank Sr. and Paula end up getting a divorce and Frank Jr. had to move a choice of which parent he wanted to live with but instead of choosing Frank Jr. ran away.
After Frank Jr. ran out of money he begins to try and cash bad checks at all of the banks. Frank Jr. quickly moves up the criminal chain when he starts impersonating an airline pilot. He also starts making fake Pan Am payroll checks. This is when Carl begins to start chasing Frank Jr. It was a long chase for Carl but he never gave up. Frank went from being a pilot to a doctor, a doctor to a lawyer, and even managed to fall in love with a girl named Brenda played by Amy Adams. The chase eventually came to an end when Carl found Frank Jr. and he decided to give up. Frank Jr. was so good at check forgery that the FBI decided to eliminate his jail sentence as long as he would work for the FBI in their fraudulent check department.
In my opinion the theme is no matter how long you run the things you do in your past will catch up with you and you will have to deal with the consequences. The obvious example is the main character Frank Jr. getting caught and sentenced for all the crimes he committed. Another example is Frank Sr. was committing fraud on his taxes. This caught up with him and caused him to lose all of his worldly things and his family. Finally Paula was having an affair and tried to keep it a secret but it caught up with her because the affair broke up her home which in turn caused Frank Jr. to run away. I feel like this theme could be applied to many other movies. For example The Cider House Rules, Roses father was having sex with her and he also attempted to keep it a secret. He even denied having sex with her when questioned about it. This eventually caught up to him to because he got Rose pregnant.
The movie is mainly shot from an objective point of view and the lighting is mainly high-key lighting, except when Frank Jr. was in prison (the lighting was darker). The lighting really ties in with the theme of the movie. When Frank Jr. was free and living life the lighting was bright but when he finally got caught the lighting was darker.
I must say I truly enjoyed this movie. Not only does the theme teach a lesson but the acting was great and the movie kept my attention the whole time. I give it two thumbs up!