Watching a neighbor's cat turns lethal in 'Caught Stealing'

"I have enjoyed many films directed by Darren Aronofsky, even the ones whose titles alone can trigger stomach-turning images of flesh being mutilated or pulverized. With Black Swan, the first thing I think of is Natalie Portman peeling away the skin from her fingers. With The Wrestler, it's Mickey Rourke mishandling a meat slicer. Thankfully, I have only vague memories of Jared Leto's gangrenous arm from Requiem for a Dream."

"By his grisly standards, the darkly funny crime thriller Caught Stealing comes across as a lighter affair, even though it has a sky-high body count and its protagonist loses a kidney in the first half-hour. The movie, which was adapted by Charlie Huston from his own 2014 novel, takes place in New York in 1998. It begins with a shot of the Twin Towers, and there's an early reference to Mayor Rudy Giuliani's draconian crackdowns on local nightlife."

"Austin Butler stars as Hank Thompson, who works at an East Village dive bar, lives in a grimy apartment and has a girlfriend, Yvonne, played by a good if frustratingly sidelined Zoe Kravitz. Yvonne is a paramedic, which comes in handy soon enough. One day, Hank's next-door neighbor, Russ that's Matt Smith, with a fiery orange Mohawk has to leave town due to a family emergency and persuades a reluctant Hank to watch his cat. Nothing good comes of this."

Darren Aronofsky often pushes the human body to extremes of physical and spiritual endurance, pairing grisly imagery with dark humor. Caught Stealing is a darker comedy crime thriller with a high body count and a protagonist who loses a kidney early. The film was adapted from Charlie Huston’s 2014 novel and is set in New York in 1998, opening with the Twin Towers and a reference to Rudy Giuliani’s nightlife crackdowns. Austin Butler plays Hank Thompson, an East Village bar worker whose paramedic girlfriend Yvonne (Zoe Kravitz) helps after he is beaten by two Russian-speaking mobsters. Detective Elise Roman (Regina King) later shows Hank a photo of two suspicious Ultra-Orthodox men, played by Liev Schreiber and Vincent D'Onofri.

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