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Could someone let me know the meaning of the kanji 摑 that is the first character in this phrase? It's in a dialog from a movie scenario.

掴まえようとする

It doesn't seem to be a 常用漢字 as far as I can tell.

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摑まえようとする is read as tukamae-you to suru. It means to try to catch. You may notice that the non-radical part is 國. In modern Japanese orthography, this is written as 国. Knowing this, you should be able to surmise that this is equivalent to 掴.

Other ways to look this up:

  • Most 漢和辞典 should include this character. Search by the radical (手) and then count the remaining number of strokes.
  • Most modern IMEs (including those in Windows) allow you to draw the character and it will match this.
  • Unihan has similar search functionality by radical + remaining stokes.
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    It's worth pointing out that 掴 is an "extended shinjitai" (拡張新字体) character – the current policy is that non-jōyō kanji should be printed in their original forms, which in this case is 摑.
    – Zhen Lin
    Aug 2, 2014 at 20:02
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It's [掴]{つか}まえる to capture, seize, catch, arrest, hold, etc., also written as 捕まえる (or 捉まえる). (See 大辞泉 dictionary entry for more information.)

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