Frank Abagnale was an intelligent man. One of the most successful con men in history, Frank lived as a pilot, doctor, lawyer and an FBI agent all before his 21st birthday. His primary technique was defrauding banks using different fake check schemes eventually amounting to over 2.5 million dollars. Along with a friend, Frank wrote his story which was later turned into an autobiographical film starring Leonardo DiCaprio and directed by Steven Speilberg. Much of what Frank accomplished in the film defied believability.

Throughout the film Frank is creating different identities to try and make some money, but even though his name is changed his personality seems to remain the same. From the beginning his father, Frank Sr., is a huge role model for him and becomes the source of Frank’s longing for acceptance and appreciation. Once his parents are divorced Frank just wants everything to be ok and to have the perfect family back together, no matter the cost. In his eyes, his father just needs to win his mother back with a better life and material things when in reality, the relationship has been over for quite some time, a truth made clearly evident by his mother’s affair. Unable to deal with the stress of choosing which parent to live with, Frank runs away and soon realizes he needs to find a way to make money quickly. He first begins to create fake checks at different banks, scamming them out of hundreds of dollars and eventually realizing he needs to find a different way to bring in a steady cash flow. He becomes a pilot for Pan Am Airlines as a “deadhead” who is a backup pilot and therefore does no actual flying on the plane. Meanwhile the FBI’s fraud division has caught on to Frank’s scams and begins to track him down with one detective leading the investigation: Carl Hanratty. It becomes Carl’s personal goal to find Frank with little to no support from the rest of the FBI. Frank continues to scam his way throughout the country, becoming a doctor and a defense attorney. Even almost becoming a married man with one of his love interests but was caught and had to escape.

Throughout the story Frank still has contact with his father and assures him he’s doing fine and creating a wonderful life for himself. Frank Sr. believes his son’s lies until Detective Hanratty visits him one day asking the whereabouts of Frank Jr. Frank Sr. lies to the detective and claims to know nothing of Frank’s current location, protecting his son despite being hurt by the truth. At one point Frank Jr. comes back home to his father to convince him yet again that the family can be put back together. Frank Sr. tells his son that this can never happen as well as his son “stopping all this nonsense”. Frank Jr. begs his father to tell him to stop but the only words his father has are “you can’t”. Frank is eventually tracked down in France and extradited to the U.S. under the assumption he will work for the FBI under Hanratty’s supervision. Frank agrees and becomes one of the leading investigators for the FBI fraud division using his extensive knowledge to decipher new ways to stop criminals just like him.

All of the personas Frank portrayed in the movie were in fact true. Some were given up for different reasons, not just for the fact that he was being chased by the FBI. His longest impersonation (11 months) was that of a doctor in Georgia who was created solely to impress a landlord who he thought would check his credibility as a Pan Am pilot. He did very little work as the supervising doctor but was almost exposed during one incident with a suffocating baby and once there was a replacement he realized he was putting people’s lives at risk and left. Frank claims that his passing of the bar exam was a genuine passing and that he didn’t cheat or use any other means to get the license. The conditions in the French prison were represented quite accurately with poor care for Frank; no toilet, bed, and rarely any food or water. His parents’ divorce was also true but had little effect on Frank’s life compared to how it is depicted in the movie. This was added by Speilberg, who also went through a parental divorce at a young age, to give Frank something to work towards, his father’s acceptance.

The falsified details in the film begin with Frank’s family and his relationship with them. His parents did divorce when he was 16 but he was one of four children and was given to his father while his siblings stayed with his mother. Frank Sr. was in fact the one who tried desperately to get his wife back, all the while neglecting Frank Jr. leading him to run away, never to see his father again. Carl Hanratty was not a real character in Frank’s life but was loosely based off of FBI agent Joe Shaye who does still work with Frank Jr. to this day. Frank’s time in prison is depicted as short in the film, with only a short time in French prison and the rest as an FBI consultant, but in real life he went through 6 months in the House of Arrest in France and was then transferred to a Swedish prison for 6 months. He was then scheduled to be tried in Italy but was extradited to the U.S. after his passport was revoked. After 5 years in the federal prison he was given the choice (which wasn’t the case in the film) of working for the FBI in New York. He declined since he didn’t want to see his family again and ended up being paroled in Texas. After getting fired from odd jobs due to his criminal past he went to a federal bank and made a proposition. He would promise to figure out how new criminals were stealing money from the bank if they dropped his name at other branches and paid him $500. They accepted after seeing his work and signed him on as a security consultant and eventually created his own business, Abagnale & Associates which advises different businesses on fraud protection. Now a millionaire, Frank’s different fraud prevention programs are being used by over 14,000 institutions.

Many of the details in the movie were far from the truth but were vital to telling a compelling, emotional journey of a man just trying to make some money and get his family back together. The real Frank Jr. had little input on the movie but was very pleased with how Speilberg brought his book to life. The things added to the film didn’t seem out of place and served as a tool to shape the person the director wanted us to connect with. In real life Frank was just using his skills to do something for his own personal gain, whereas in the movie, many of the stretched truths are used to create a sympathetic bond with Frank Jr. In the end both Franks were given what they wanted: freedom, acceptance and a bit of money.

Abagnale Jr., Frank, Adapt. Catch Me If You Can. Dir. Steven Speilberg. Dreamworks, 2002. Film. .

Catch Me If You Can

Allison Crump

English 101