Is CMIYC a comedy score?

[scissorhands 16]

I was wondering if Catch Me If You Can (composed by John Williams in 2002, if you can remember it, as it seems to have been forgotten by everybody ) is a comedy score.

On the one hand, there is the jazzy part for Tom Hanks/the chase, very funny. On the other hand, Abagnale's "adventures" theme, which, in my opinion, is also a comedy theme.

But there is a dramatic theme too, Father and Son, and this is the most important one (IMHO), at least emotional/dramatically.

So (overal), is CMIYC a comedy or drama score?

[Elmo Lewis 6]

I would say it's a delightful mixture of both. It wouldn't be fair to limit it to just comedy, or drama. Besides, both its comedy and drama part are so "light", so matter-of-fact (like Spielberg's direction) they never get to be subject to a genre.

Long live The "Float"!

[Trumpeteer 302]

I've never forgotten about the wonderful score. I've been listening to it almost every day as I try to pick my Oscar-winning score of 2002. (I haven't decided yet.)

Since the movie is essentially a comedy (despite what the Hollywood Foreign Press says), the score is a comedy. It's light, never overly dramatic. Even the moment when

*****SPOILER!!!!!!!*****

Tom Hanks' character tells Leo's character that his father is dead, there is a grwat lift when Frank makes his daring escape. You don't get long to feel sad in this film.

***SPOILER ENDED***

So the film, if there were still separate categories between comedy and dramatic films at the Oscars, should be grouped with comedies. But then, they put "Life is Beautiful" in the dramatic list.....

Jeff -- feeling like "Road to Perdition" will win, which will be wonderful

[King Mark 3,634]

it's a lighthearted score,one I would associate more with a comedy or light drama even before seeing the film.

K.M.

[scissorhands 16]

*****SPOILER!!!!!!!***** You don't get long to feel sad in this film.

I agree, Trumpeteer. And that scene (when Hanks tells DiCaprio SPOILER his father is dead is the only failure in the film (if you can consider it that way).

It's an excellent movie, with comedy moments (i didn't laugh that loud in a theater in the last 3 or 4 years), but I think it's -overall- a dramatic film. Notwithstanding, the score would be more close to comedy methinks.