Movie Man Darian Watching All Night Long

Caught Stealing 

This film is both a perfect blend of homage to two separate filmmakers in the best way. Now Darren Aronofsky has crafted a film that melds both of those in a way that dose not feel in any way like a rip off or remake but is very much it’s own thing. The film is a melting pot of all the great things that come to memory of 90’s crime thrillers of that decade and it feels like time capsule of a film we don’t really get anymore and it is a pressure cooker of a film that revolves around maybe 3 days and the suspense and pressure of what happens to this guy just continuously gets worse and worse and we as the audience have to see how he can get himself out of this tricky situation. Caught Stealing is a film that is a callback to old cinema crime thrillers of the past while giving viewers an experience that will have them on the edge of their seat the entire way through. 

Firstly, The film does not have a ton of character depth for the supporting characters that surround the main character but this is a film that does need to as the pacing of this film is so rapid fast their are big names in this film that contribute greatly to the screen with their characters for the amount of time they have. For instance Matt Smith is amazing in the film but maybe has 15 minutes of screen time for the entire film but once he leaves the frame you ache for more but I love how they perfectly placed each actor in this film as they all help move the plot along even if they aren’t in it for long. The film has themes of Trauma, addiction, family and owning up to your past and it is greatly shown in emotionally raw detail the way Darren has perfected the craft of showcasing that in his films over the years. The film shows bits and pieces of this nightmare that Austin Butler’s character has throughout the film that calls back to something traumatic that happened to him and he does not talk about it or emotionally open up about it until much later but the whole arc of that was greatly shown through the course of the film and the way it was handled by Austin onscreen was amazing. The tone and style of this is hard to put into words but I keep coming back to punk rock as that is what the characters and overarching tone feels to me like a punk rock dialled up to the loudest frantic feeling that has you not knowing what will come in the next few minutes for these characters. the viewer will have no idea that comes around the next corner as it keeps you on your toes the entire time and keeps you guessing on how this film will wrap up. The film is a frantic high octane film that has you stressing out about Austin’s character until the final frame and the way the film just progressively escalates and we see things just getting harder for him worked so well as we see how his character acts in these emotional tough situations which presents Butler in places emotionally we had not seen him tap into before to this extent. The film also has a great sense of comedy that arises out of the seriousness of the situations he is constantly finding himself in and it is done in a very dry way that works and never felt out of place. The comedic wit and seriousness of the film compliment each other that is why so many will draw comparisons to films like Snatch and the Gentlemen due to the witty crime nature of the film that Guy Ritchie has perfected. The whole creative team involved did a great Job at evolving this troubled main character and fleshing him out greatly on an arc that has you rooting for him and seeing all these wild characters that surround him that are also as interesting and many are scene stealers in their own right but again the film gives this old rugged look at filmmaking in the crime action category we don’t really see anymore and you can feel the passion pouring out of Darren Aronofsky who captures the paranoia and troubled youth of this character amazingly onscreen. Overall the tone and the way this film is structured is so fun and fast paced it moves a mile a minute in the best way possible while also delving into deep rooted themes that are shown in very emotionally honest ways. 

Secondly, The cast of this film is huge and all of them contribute greatly to the film in their own special way! Now the film of course revolves around Austin Butler who I think gives one of his strongest performances we have seen so far in a role that has him go through the full spectrum of emotions and we see him rattled to the core of how the situation he is thrust into impacts him. The highlights that stood out for me in the great cast was firstly Matt Smith he plays this over the top shady character who is not really in the film for much he maybe shares 15 minutes of screen time but when he is onscreen he lights up the frame with his great onscreen presence and commanding charisma. He plays this fast mouthed witty personality that is dealing with some questionable characters but we don’t learn that until much later he walks into the scene in the beginning with such energy you can’t help but want to see more from him. He does show up later on but disappears shortly after he comes back and they had the perfect amount of length for his character as he was great in small amounts and when he was offscreen he made you want to see more of him as he leaves such a lasting impression in the film. You can clearly see Matt Smith having the time of his life letting loose and playing this unpredictable character that does and says what he wants when he wants and we never fully know the extent of who he is and I love that. Matt Smith delivers a hilarious and memorable performance to this film that I would say is among one of my recent favourites of his. Then you have Zoe Kravitz who plays in many reasons the voice of reason for Austin Butler’s character. Austin’s character does not listen to her advice despite her many efforts to try to help him and Zoe Kravitz’s character clearly wants to go deeper into the relationship they have and not have it be just psychical but have it go somewhere on an emotional level and she voices that to him in a great scene early on. If he listens is one thing but she voices what she values in a relationship and sure Zoe is not in the film a great deal but the reason he thinks with his heart in many ways is in large part due to how she got him to open up as before her he was a very closed off person that held things close to the chest. Zoe brings an emotional guidance for him while also doing her best to flesh her out as much as she can in this small part she has she did a great job! Then you have the star of the film Austin Butler who I think gives one of his finest performances of his career with his work on this film. He packs such an emotional punch in this film cementing himself as a bonafide movie star that isn’t just a pretty face but can actually show quite an amazing range and is a force to be reckoned with in the new wave of actors being ushered in Butler is sensational! Now the rest of the cast of the film is superb but the main person that walks away with this film in term of performance is Austin Butler. 

Lastly, Caught Stealing is one of the best crime Thrillers I have seen all year! Darren Aronofsky has crafted an homage to a old school way of filmmaking that we don’t see anymore within this genre while Also serving up fresh ways of presenting his plot without it falling into the tropes and stereotypes of this genre that has been visited to many times over. It has great thrills and twists and turns and brings you places narratively you don’t see it going along with truly hilarious comedy that is placed in the right areas for it to work. It has the style feel Of Scorsese’s After Hours and Wit of a Guy Ritchie film with a truly well centred performance by Austin Butler Caught Stealing is one of the most energetic crime thrillers I have seen all year and one I can see becoming a classic in years from now. I recommend anyone who again is fans of Scorsese and Guy Ritchie to check this film out it very much feels in the same vein of both filmmakers while still being it’s own thing.

This film surrounds around a troubled young man who is told to look after his neighbours cat for the weekend but when people from his neighbours life come knocking he quickly learns he has been brought into a situation he couldn’t of expected. 

Rated R : (Some Sexuality/Nudity|Pervasive Language|Brief Drug Use|Strong Violent Content

Austin Butler : Butler delivers what I think is his best onscreen performance yet and yes even better than his work in Elvis! Now here’s the thing he really blew up in 2022 with Elvis as his performance from that film was the talk of the film and well deservingly so as his hard work and dedication to bring the king of Rock and Roll to life was no easy task and he gave a sensational turn in that film their is no disputing that. That being said he has slowly but surly been building an amazing body of work since then from Dune part II, the Bikeriders, his small role in Eddingtion to now Caught Stealing he has been constantly finding new roles that challenge him as an actor to stretch his emotional abilities with new characters. Here he plays this guy who is just getting by but we learn he was a baseball prodigy that lost his shot at the big times due to a tragic accident he went through many years earlier and so that is why he is working at a bar and has a small apartment and has a girl he sees when he can having this quiet life that you can clearly see he enjoys. It isn’t until his neighbour goes away for a weekend and asks him to watch his cat that things start to shake up his life in ways he couldn’t even imagine and when two thugs show up demanding answers he is thrown in a whirlwind constantly trying to find answers to piece together what is happening and from that moment on his situation we see just gets progressively worse and harder and he is met with emotionally gutting moments that would break most people. We see throughout the film he is having night terrors and seeing an accident play out in these nightmares but their fragments of bits and pieces and isn’t until much later we learn what that is and I love the whole aspect of that being a full arc for his character to come to terms with. His girlfriend even has a moment where she tells him flat out that she wants a relationship that will have deep connection and not just be psychical  love and he has a tough time communicating his feelings to her as he is a pretty guarded guy which only his relationship with her become strained due to his lack of clear commutation to her about his feelings towards her. He has so much bad things happen to him one after the other their comes a moment when he is on the beach and just punches his leg over and over and just lets out this blood curling scream coming deep from his soul letting out all of that pain he has just been getting crushed by for the last couple of days and you can feel every ounce of it in that moment. Austin Butler brings this emotional restraint to the role for a good half of the film and as the film progresses the film peels layers back of why he holds so much to his chest. He has been plagued by tragedy early in his life and seeing him deal with all this stuff only makes him have to revisit those old feelings and in many ways have to deal with his untreated trauma.  Their is a moment where he comes to term with his past in a great full circle moment later on but again Austin shows such fierce emotional rawness and he bears his soul onscreen in ways we have not seen him do before and I love that he just plunged himself emotionally into this character to keep raising the bar on what he can do as an actor. He goes through the full spectrum of emotional hardships from denial, sadness, being totally numb, anger and then acceptance and Austin is able to channel each emotion with such great believability through his speech and his body language he Is truly fantastic in this film. I cannot stop praising his work In the film I also have said and I stand by this his work in this film also shows he is not just a pretty faced actor but is a legitimate actor with great range and versatility as he stretches himself from both ends emotionally to give audiences complex characters and here he shows he is a bonafide movie star. Austin shines in this film when he is constantly knocked on his ass multiple times he gets up and finds a way out of this tough spot he finds himself in and the way he brings this emotional tenderness through this character was brilliant and I think it is his finest work we have seen from his so far Austin is amazing in this film! 

Darren Aronofsky : Darren gives his nod to 90’s crime thrillers of the heyday with his work on this film! Now I have been following this director ever since 08’s the Wrestler and ever since I saw that film I have constantly loved his approach to storytelling and his ability to show characters at their most vulnerable. As he has tackled some incredibly hard subjects in his films and here I will say it is the most lighthearted he has been in terms of emotional exploration if that makes sense. As I mentioned he has gone to some very dark places tone wise in the past and here he still has some very deep tones but not to the extent of his past work. He is having fun creating a crime caper that is about a guy who’s back is constantly against the wall and has to find his way out of a very hard situation and as I mentioned earlier you can feel the homage to Scorsese’s After Hours and I know their will be tons of companions to that film and the style of Guy Ritchie’s snappy dialogue in this film. It never felt like a rip off of his other colleagues other work but more of a tip of the hat as this film is still very much his own and I love that he went for an approach that is very kinetic and fast paced with over the top characters that never feel cartoony but have a great deal of comedic value to them for the audience to laugh at through the serious moments as a breather. Their are so many big names in this film and a ton of colourful characters that all give great impressions on the screen but they never overstay their welcome they help push the story forward and then they leave like Matt Smith his character is so wild and fun but we don’t see a ton of him he rather leave the audience wanting more and not grow sick of him by having him in for too long I respect that. The film deals with alcoholism, numbing ones pain in order to not deal with the past but ultimately having to confront one’s past in order to move past it. As the Austin Butler character has never been the same since the accident he had earlier in his life and that gets explored In great detail but what is so great about his arc is he constantly shuts down about his pain on the topic until later on you can see he has to deal with it or else he will never ever be out of pain because of it. The film also has great comedic relief their is some genuinely great laughs that emerge from the serious moments or the actors themselves having great timing in when to give a joke and it never makes the serious scenes feel deflated by the comedy but it works for this type of film that they are going for that is able to balance drama and comedy in a perfect blend in the way Snatch or the Gentleman does. Seeing a fun crime caper film like this we don’t really see on a large scale like this anymore and I love that Darren wanted to recapture the magic of that genre once again and I think he did a terrific job at it giving one of his most lighthearted but still deep films where audiences can have fun but still feel emotionally moved Darren soars once again with another greatly directed film.