While I suspect that this movie is a bit of a fabrication because it says it was "inspired by a true story", which has to be a step below "based on a true story", there was some truth in there somewhere. We do know that Frank William Abagnale Jr. (Leonardo DiCaprio) was a con man who, before his 19th birthday, wrote millions of dollars of fraudulent checks and passed himself off as a pilot, doctor and lawyer.
FBI agent Carl Hanratty (Tom Hanks), meanwhile, is his foil, who tracks him across the country and finally around the world to bring him down. Time after time they cross paths as Abagnale goes through identities and his checks get better and better. We're watching a movie, but it's probably somewhat accurate in that the first batch of checks he passes are little more than paper with some decals on them.
The last checks he uses, meanwhile, are beautiful forgeries, printed on massive printing presses, faithful recreations of the actual checks themselves, completely indistinguishable from the real thing. This speaks to the damage that he was doing to the banks with his check-passing schemes.
So Carl spends years chasing Frank around the world, trying to nab him, and in at least one instance, actually meets him face-to-face, but the quick-thinking Frank uses one of his many fake identifications to pretend that he is actually another law-enforcement officer, and takes off before he can get caught.
In the end, of course, Frank is caught. But in an odd sort of twist, he goes to work for the FBI catching other fraudsters, and is apparently responsible for many of the check security measures that we see on today's checks. In a strange twist of fate, Frank and Carl became good friends.
Rated PG-13 for some sexual content and brief language, but I have to disagree with this one. While most youngsters will probably be bored with this because it does run for a while, there is little offensive material to be found within. Most of the "sexual content" is implied and is less than can be seen on network television any night of the week, and the same can be said of the language.
I have a bit of admiration for con men. In this case, not the forged checks, but being able to pass yourself off as a profession of which you aren't. With today's technology, making a forged check should be a piece of cake.
Posted by Ted | June 27, 2006 9:26 AM