Just saw "Catch Me If You Can". Got a question.

[TommyVercetti]

Gooood movie, two thumbs up all the way. But I have a question though. I still don't see how he flew as an airline co-pilot. Well the first time, he was mistaken for some else. What about the rest of the times? How would he get on the plane?

Another question. When he first finds out that he can cash payroll checks upto $300, he makes a fake PAN AM payroll check. I don't think he had ever seen a PAN AM payroll check before. How was he able to duplicae one so exactly?

 

[0roo0roo]

i can't wait for the dvd

theres a book you know, that might be more detailed.

 

[NakaNaka]

He never flew a plane. He just sat in that third seat the whole time and pretended to be a co-pilot.

As for the checks, I'm not sure. I think the first time he just did it as best he could because the bank tellers probably didn't have one on file to compare with. I'm not sure. There is a book, and it's a pretty easy read to, like 150 pages. You should check it out. It is written by him.

 

[Scarpozzi]

I heard the guy once on an audio tape telling his story in the early 90s. I want to see the movie to see how well they followed it in the movie. He only flew stand-by....this is something the airlines used to allow pilots to do as a job perk and helped them get home or visit family since they were always in the sky away from home. On the audio tape, he said that he didn't know anything about planes and would hang out in bars and talk to other pilots....he didn't know their lingo, and ended up looking like an idiot in front of some of them...but abruptly left.

As far as duplicating the payroll check, I don't know about that, but I'm sure that if you hang around the PAN AM offices long enough in a smaller airport, you can probably get away with anything if you have an ID card. I think most of this stuff happened before computers were as efficient as they are now....the ID was all he needed.

 

[damiano]

reaaaally good movie

 

[src]

come on you guys are kidding right? the story was so childish!

 

[Ketteringo]

Originally posted by: src
come on you guys are kidding right? the story was so childish!

Its a true story, thats just how the world was back then. People actually trusted other people. I really enjoyed this movie! Especially the sound track by John Williams. Also, the opening credits were very cool, it was old but it had flares of new technology also!

 

[damiano]

Originally posted by: src
come on you guys are kidding right? the story was so childish!

it is a true story
that's what is so amazing....

 

[BigSmooth]

I think that the first checks he faked (with the toy plane logos) did not actually look like real PanAm payroll checks - the logo just made them look official enough for the tellers to be fooled once he had charmed them a bit.
I believe the more realistic PanAm checks he fakes later have the logo on the bottom right instead of the top left.

All in all, I liked the movie, a little slow moving at times but some excellent performances from Hanks, DiCaprio, and Walken.

 

[psteng19]

Hanks accent sounded really annoying and fake IMO.
And so did DiCaprio's.

 

[abaez]

That accent was right on the money by Hanks. You've just grown accustomed to bad accents by other actors like that

 

[Reel]

Originally posted by: TommyVercetti
Gooood movie, two thumbs up all the way. But I have a question though. I still don't see how he flew as an airline co-pilot. Well the first time, he was mistaken for some else. What about the rest of the times? How would he get on the plane?

Another question. When he first finds out that he can cash payroll checks upto $300, he makes a fake PAN AM payroll check. I don't think he had ever seen a PAN AM payroll check before. How was he able to duplicae one so exactly?

The movie didn't emphasize how clever he really was. He would spend days hanging around learning how to pretend to be a pilot. At first he would just talk to people in the airport to learn the lingo and get a feel for how things were done. He really was a smart guy. A great heist that they left out in the movie was that he stood in front of the drop box where all airport people put their day's receipts with a bag and put up a sign saying that the drop box was out of order. He collected some enormous sum of money and even had a couple of cops help him to his car with it.

When he went on the plane, he had obtained all the necessary uniforms and made fake licenses and such to pretend he was a pilot. As was said before in this thread, the deadheading was a common practice (and may still be).

About the checks he studied really hard. He would interview people and study them. I don't remember the details exactly but I wouldn't be surprised if he had picked up a payroll check before trying to cash one. Though he comments later in the book that he couldn't believe how dumb he was when he first started the check-cashing scheme so its possible they were really poor copies.

I would definitely recommend the book if you enjoyed the movie. It details much more. There is also a few parts left out from the movie that are highly amusing and interesting. It is a short book and a really quick read.

 

[MrsHoneybee]

My hubby and I saw "Catch Me If you Can" earlier tonight, thought it was a good movie.

 

[RossMAN]

Originally posted by: MrsHoneybee
My hubby and I saw "Catch Me If you Can" earlier tonight, thought it was a good movie.

Damn you and posting from the laptop, you're beating me to it

I agree. We saw this tonight and it was excellent, loved it.

 

[DanTMWTMP]

aha i thought the movie was great too...

 

[WinkOsmosis]

What was with the nurse girl? She was ugly and annoying... I think she was a little bit retarded...

 

[0roo0roo]

Originally posted by: Jellomancer
What was with the nurse girl? She was ugly and annoying... I think she was a little bit retarded...

u mean lispy braces girl? i thought she was funny

 

[Maetryx]

Dylan Malone, drag racing high school student on the edge... but with a dream.... [play some vamping 80's music here].

 

[zeon]

coincedentally (well, not really since i'm posting this in a thread about the movie...) i met frank abagnail once... he was speaking at a luncheon i atended, and i chatted with him for a bit afterwards... he was a fairly good speaker. a little strange towards the end of his speech though as he launched into a tirade about how guilty he felt towards his country and how the most important thing in life was appartantly "finding a wife and living a god fearing, taxpaying, pta atending life..." (i added the quotes for effect, not to signify a reiteration of his exact words)...

methinks i really ought to go see the film..

 

[Spike]

yah, I really enjoyed the film as well. I thought the opening credits where so cool, definitly a different direction for spielberg. I was also a fan of the soundtrack, it is a really new way for williams to sound and he pulled it off very well

-spike