Scheduled film for November, Friday the 13th (last film before MIDTERM EXAM).

CATCH ME IF YOU CAN
Friday, 13 November 2009

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THIS FILM, DIRECTED by Steven Spielberg (2002) can be studied on several levels. Certainly it's a perfect vehicle for Leonard DiCaprio's recently minted star image following the success of Titanic. It allows DiCaprio to act out his star image in different socially attractive roles with several sexual encounters to titillate female fans. This is what the average moviegoer wants: the star recycling his star image, with new variations.
    But if it's a good film, the star is used as just a resource to narrate the film with economy. So at a deeper level, we can study the film in terms of narration technique. For example, the movie is plotted at a quick pace, suggesting the dizzy climb of the American success story and the no less rapid fall of those who succeed. Because a star is involved the viewer is interested. There's already sufficient sympathy for the star without having to work to gain that sympathy. Viewers (especially women) are rooting for DiCaprio from the beginning. In addition, plot elements, such as the sympathy DiCaprio's character shows for women throughout the film, would further increase viewer sympathy with a character who is essentially a criminal.
    One narrative strategy, the elliptical (summary) editing throughout, suggests Frankie's compulsion to act out traumatic events in his recent life (his mother's adultery, his father's economic troubles, the parents' divorce, and the collapse of his domestic world). The order of events (the narration is not in chronological order) also illustrates these cause-effect relationships through flashbacks and flashforwards.
    The familiar image is of Christmas, because Christmas represents the most nostalgic image of the childhood Frankie has lost (even one of his false identities is taken from a comic book hero). The climax of the film is the scene where Frankie looks into the window of his remarried mother's home on Christmas Eve, seeing, like a stranger, the domestic world he has lost forever. The scene works on two levels: he has lost this world because he's about to be arrested. But on a deeper level, he has lost that world because his mother's divorce and remarriage, as well as his father's death, has forever robbed him of it.
     The movie is also a textbook example of how to use source music to comment on the plot, hence to narrate the film. Sound bridges are also effectively used; that is, the scene changes as the dialogue of the previous or next scene is heard on the soundtrack.
    Finally, John Williams' untypical score is noteworthy. Williams gained fame with his huge orchestral scores for Star Wars, Superman, E.T. and similar films, many directed by Spielberg. But in this film his score is less dominant and uses mainly a small chamber arrangements.
    For example, a simple jazz riff in fugal (chase) form is used, for obvious reasons, to express the pattern of the chase, which is the superficial subject of the film, also represented in the arty credit sequence design. Sad saxophone motifs are also heard, evoking the loneliness and frustration of the characters.
    As with so many movies in the last 25 years, this film could use some plot editing. It's rare that a movie that goes over two hours needs the extra time, unless the movie has epic scope. After a while the many scams and escapes in this film become pointless, since there's little development of character in the later scams (we already know Frankie is good at scamming and changing his personality), while the chase itself becomes tedious in its its repetitions.

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