“Caught Stealing” was not some masterpiece sent to audiences, bringing life into the cinema. Out of the few movies that came out this August, this would be at bottom of the list.
Releasing the final weekend of August, “Caught Stealing,” was set to tell the story of how a man’s life gets turned upside down after babysitting his neighbor’s cat. The trailer paints a very different picture than what audiences were presented in theaters. While the story of Hank, played by Austin Butler, forced into a life of crime is close enough to the trailer, the tone and routes that Director Darren Aronofsky takes were utterly shocking.
The one saving grace of the film was some of the characters. All the actors had solid performances, but none did as well as Austin Butler and Zoë Kravitz, who had an exceptionally good showing as Hank and Yvonne. They brought their characters to life. The emotions felt natural, and their onscreen dynamic was the film highlight.
One of the big issues with the movie is that, outside of the small cast of characters, the world just feels hollow. Outside of a few short scenes, there aren’t many other people around. “Caught Stealing” is a movie about some average guy getting his life flipped upside down as he is chased around by a small handful of thugs. It doesn’t match its setting of 1998 New York.
The movie would have benefited by more scenes involving normal civilians more room to breathe and showing audiences the aftermath of certain events taking place throughout.
The film’s lack of direction also keeps it from being great. Sure the story continues to progress, but most of the action happens for no reason. Not every movie needs a big overarching story, but after the first act, it feels empty.
The biggest crime this film is guilty of has to be the pacing. Most of the emotional parts happen in the first half of the movie, after that it’s a chore to watch.
Most audience members can look past the problems of the film and enjoy it. But those who are more selective on what films they consume should probably think twice on whether to watch the movie.
Overall while there are many things that could have been done better, it’s still an okay movie. Definitely not ideal to take parents to due to some explicit scenes. But the actors did amazing and that’s reason enough to give it a chance.
