''Catch That Kid'' is a 2004

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

action comedy film Action comedy is a genre that combines aspects of action and comedy. The genre is most prevalent in film with action comedy films, though several TV series fit this genre. Film The action comedy film is a film genre that combines aspects of a ...

directed by

Bart Freundlich Bartholomew Freundlich (born January 17, 1970) is an American film director, television director, screenwriter, and film producer. Early life Freundlich was born and raised in Manhattan, the son of Debbie, a marketing consultant, and Larry Fre ...

, written by Michael Brandt and Derek Haas, and starring

Kristen Stewart Kristen Jaymes Stewart (born April 9, 1990) is an American actress. The world's highest-paid actress in 2012, she has received various accolades, including a British Academy Film Award and a César Award, in addition to nominations for an Ac ...

Corbin Bleu Corbin Bleu Reivers (; born February 21, 1989), known professionally as Corbin Bleu, is an American actor and singer. He made his acting debut in the 2004 adventure comedy film '' Catch That Kid''. He has since appeared in the Discovery Kids dr ...

, Max Thieriot,

Jennifer Beals Jennifer Beals (born December 19, 1963) is an American actress and former teen model. She made her film debut in '' My Bodyguard'' (1980), before receiving critical acclaim for her role in '' Flashdance'' (1983), for which she won NAACP Image ...

, Sam Robards,

John Carroll Lynch John Carroll Lynch (born August 1, 1963) is an American character actor and film director. He first gained notice for his role as Norm Gunderson in ''Fargo'' (1996). He is also known for his television work on the ABC sitcom ''The Drew Carey Show ...

, and James Le Gros. It is a

remake A remake is a film, television series, video game, song or similar form of entertainment that is based upon and retells the story of an earlier production in the same medium—e.g., a "new version of an existing film". A remake tells the sa ...

of the Danish film '' Klatretøsen'' (2002) and tells the story of three kids who rob a bank to obtain the money to pay for the expensive and experimental surgery needed for the father of one of them when the insurance company and the bank president won't help his wife. The film's working titles were ''Mission Without Permission'' (also the film's UK title as well as part of one of the taglines), ''Catch That Girl'', and ''Catch That Kid!'' The film was met with negative reviews.

Plot

Madeline Rose "Maddy" Phillips (

) is a 12-year-old girl who loves to climb, often ascending the nearby water tower. Her father Tom shares her passion, but fell more than 100 feet during a climb years earlier. Tom and his wife Molly (

) are afraid Maddy may suffer a similar accident and have forbidden her from climbing. Latent injuries from Tom's fall have recently paralyzed him from the neck down. The family hears of an experimental operation which can save him, but insurance will not pay for the operation and the family does not have $250,000 for the treatment. Harderbach Financial's president Donald Brisbane (

Michael Des Barres Michael Philip Des Barres (born 24 January 1948), the 26th Marquis Des Barres, is an English actor and rock singer. He appeared as Murdoc in the original ''MacGyver'', Nicholas Helman, Murdoc's mentor, on the new reboot of ''MacGyver'' (2016) ...

) refuses to loan the amount, despite Molly being employed by the bank to design a security system. Maddy comes up with a plan to rob the bank for the money with her knowledge of her mother's system. Maddy steals three go-carts from her father's race course and recruits her two friends Gus ( Max Thieriot) a young mechanic, and Austin (

) a computer geek and aspiring filmmaker, to help her. To convince them, she separately tells each one she loves him and gives him one half of her friendship necklace. They break into Harderbach Financial on the night of a party Brisbane is throwing, bringing along Max, Maddy's infant brother, who she is supposed to be babysitting. Maddy distracts the security guards Ferrell ( James Le Gross) and Gus' older brother Chad ( Stark Sands). Maddy and Gus progress to a room with thousands of security deposit boxes while Austin watches Max and manipulates the cameras and alarms to keep the guards away from them. After a sudden equipment failure with her climbing gear, Maddy is forced to free climb the rest of the way up to the main vault containing hundreds of thousands of dollars. Upon reaching the vault door, she accidentally triggers a timer, then with seconds left, cracks the code ("Madeline"), grabs $250,000 from the vault and they flee the room, unintentionally setting off the alarm after forgetting to type the exit code. The trio manages to escape the bank's

Rottweiler The Rottweiler (, ) is a breed of domestic dog, regarded as medium-to-large or large. The dogs were known in German as , meaning Rottweil butchers' dogs, because their main use was to herd livestock and pull carts laden with butchered m ...

s and re-escapes Chad who tasers Ferrell, but then lets them go before accidentally tasering himself. Molly arrives at the bank and Brisbane accuses her system of being useless and fires a Phillips family friend and bank employee Hartmann (

). Brisbane's guest Francois Nuffaut (Françios Giroday) apologizes to Molly and redirects the blame onto Brisbane for throwing a party at the bank before the security system was operable. Gus and Austin find out that Maddy played them after seeing each other's necklaces and leave her, but the trio reunites during a police chase and evades them successfully. Maddy and her friends go to the hospital with the money to pay for the surgery, but Molly realizes who the thieves are (through the amount they stole being equal to that of surgery costs and the climbing gear Maddy left in the vault) and intercepts them. Molly realizes her daughter was only doing what she thought was right for her father and does a cover-up by telling the bank executives that the robbery was an unplanned test she performed as chief of security. As they leave, reporters outside the hospital give the public the full story. Molly forgives Maddy for her actions, the public and the news studio sympathizes with the Phillips family and donates money for Tom's surgery, Brisbane is fired, and Hartmann is promoted to bank president and gives them the loan. Three months later, Tom has recovered from the surgery. Maddy, Gus, and Austin continue to argue about who will be a better boyfriend for Maddy.

Cast

Production

Mara Wilson revealed she auditioned for the role of Maddy Phillips, despite knowing she was too old for the role, in an 2016 article written by the actress for

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide ...

Reception

Box office

''Catch That Kid'' opened at #6 in the weekend of February 6, 2004 raking in $5.8 million in its first opening weekend. The film spent two weeks at the U.S. box office top ten. The film made $16.7 million in the United States and $226,963 in other countries for a worldwide total of $16.9 million, against a budget of $12 million.

Critical response

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

, the film received an approval rating of 13% based on 86 reviews and an average score of 3.82/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "An unimaginative heist movie aimed strictly at the preteen set." On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

, the film holds a score of 33 out of 100, based on 27 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Critics overall expressed dislike towards the film's questionable morals and lack of originality, comparing it unfavorably to the ''Spy Kids'' trilogy. Despite these negative reviews,

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

of Ebert & Roeper and the

Chicago Sun Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...

gave ''Catch That Kid'' "thumbs up", stating that it is as much fun as '' Spy Kids'', ''

Kim Possible ''Kim Possible'' is an American animated action comedy-adventure television series created by Bob Schooley and Mark McCorkle for Disney Channel. The title character is a teenage girl tasked with fighting crime on a regular basis while copi ...

'' and more fun than ''

Agent Cody Banks ''Agent Cody Banks'' is a 2003 American spy action comedy film directed by Harald Zwart. The film follows the adventures of the 15-year-old title character, played by Frankie Muniz, who has to finish his chores, avoid getting grounded, and sa ...

''.

Novelization

novelization A novelization (or novelisation) is a derivative novel that adapts the story of a work created for another medium, such as a film, TV series, stage play, comic book or video game. Film novelizations were particularly popular before the advent of ...

of the story was released in conjunction with the film. The novel was written by Suzanne Weyn, Michael Brandt, and Derek Haas.

References

External links

* * * * {{Bart Freundlich 2004 films 2000s adventure comedy films 2000s crime comedy films 2000s heist films 2000s teen comedy films American adventure comedy films American children's comedy films American teen comedy films American crime comedy films American heist films American spy films American remakes of Danish films English-language German films German spy films German adventure comedy films English-language Danish films Danish comedy films 20th Century Fox films Films directed by Bart Freundlich Films scored by George S. Clinton Films shot in Los Angeles Films set in Los Angeles 2004 comedy films 2000s English-language films 2000s American films 2000s German films