Question:
Describe the closing scene(s) or section of the text.
Explain how this part of the text was predictable or unexpected, supporting your points with visual and / or oral language features.
Essay:
Starting off on the wrong foot will give you a predictable ending. This is displayed through the 2002 film ‘Catch Me if You Can’ by Steven Spielburg. The film follows the journey of Frank Abagnale Jr. (the protagonist) who fled from his home due to a divorce of his parents at 16 years old. Leading him into a life of bad choices, wrong expectations and a predictable ending of his con-artist life. This links to a wider understanding that the more mistakes you make, the more unlucky the ending will be. The film itself uses an abundant variety of film techniques that includes camera angles/shots/movement, sound, focus and lighting.
The very first mistake that Frank Abagnale Jr. made was running away from home. Once he made the decision to run away from home, his life was doomed from the beginning. Frank came home to news that clearly affected him and clung onto him throughout his life. He was informed that his parents were getting a divorce which by the use of close up of his face, shows how scared and clueless he was in this situation. With the use of mid shot, it shows how Frank was running away from his problems instead of facing it. Frank never gave the divorce a chance to work, instead he let his emotions control him and made him avoid the situation that will haunt him later in life. By this scene, it showed how the ending would be predictable because as he ran away, he ran away from his shelter, any form of love, food, money and importantly, he ran away from his old life. Forcibly making Frank survive on his own without any assistance or guidance which parents were in charge of before letting any of their own child go into the real world. Upon the first mistake, it is Frank’s choice and decision whether to learn from it or ignore it.
The second mistake that Frank Abagnale Jr. made was making more bad choices and decisions. Frank became a criminal once he put on that pilot uniform and used the perks of being a pilot to forge cheques in exchange for any amount of money. This is shown through the scene where he entered the hotel and fooled everyone that he was a higher class than what he actually was. The use of Medium Close Up shows his uniform and also his expression when being told that he can earn more by submitting in a payroll cheque. This shot showed his uniform, which informs the viewer that Frank has tricked the man he was talking to in the hotel into thinking that he was an actual pilot, and that he deserves the respect and courtesy that actual pilots receive. This shot also allows us to see how Frank was forming an idea as soon as the man had mentioned that payroll cheque could give him more money. By this scene, the ending would be predictable because he is committing a crime by being a fake pilot/fraud and using that to forge cheques in exchange for big amounts of money.
The third mistake that Frank made was expecting that he could get out of the chase after stealing almost four million dollars. All of Frank’s life was a police chase. Police would chase him everywhere Frank goes while he skipped country to country. Yet, Frank still had the hope that the police would stop chasing just so he could settle down. This was shown through the scene where it was christmas day and Frank had called Carl Hanratty to ask if they could stop chasing him. Frank explained how “I want it to be over” “I want to call a truce”. This dialogue that Frank has said to Carl showed how desperate he wanted everything to be over and that Frank is just wanting to settle down after all the years of crime he has gone through. By this scene, the ending is predictable because as Frank stops running, the cops will take advantage of the situation and will become closer and closer to catching Frank that in the end, he gets caught.
Frank staring off on the wrong foot only gave him a predictable ending. This summarizes how Frank’s mistakes of running away from home, committing a life of crime and still expecting to not be caught gave him a predictable ending of being caught in the end. All together, Steven Spielburg has given us a film that we can learn from. Steven has created the idea through the film that the more mistakes you make and not learn from, the more predictable and unlucky the ending will be.
