Caught Stealing |
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2 February 2026 - Erlenbach
Caught Stealing caught me by surprise. I thought maybe it would be a comedy leading toward slapstick because of the violence. Austin Butler's portrayal of Hank in 1990's New York brings to life Charlie Huston's excellent writing. On the surface it's a crime story, but underneath it's also a story of personal growth for Hank. He has repeatedly wrecked his life with alcohol, as we learn through dream flashbacks that have him waking up with a startle. He was drunk driving as a teen and crashed, killing a friend and ruining his own knee and baseball career. At the outset of the movie this drinking (beers for breakfast) leads to serious injury and the loss of a kidney when he is beaten up by Russian mobsters looking for his neighbor. He tells the police, "it's not my fault", but his girlfriend poignantly asks why he lets himself get into trouble. During their love scene she not so subtly puts out her cigarette in his beer so he will stop drinking and give her his attention. The loss of his kidney forces the decision about alcohol and we see Hank removing it from cabinet after cabinet in his house and pouring it down the drain. But old habits die hard and we soon see him so drunk that his girlfriend has to pick him up from the bar. She leaves him to go home when he insults her on the street and then she is murdered by Jewish mobsters looking for Hank. The side characters peppering the movie with Russian, Yiddish and Spanish really add believability and depth to the film. Then the Russian mobsters come back in cahoots with the police and kill the people Hank works with at their bar. As things are getting bloodier he calls his mom and takes responsibility for the death of his friend who dies in the car crash as a teenager for the first time. Through the crisis Hank is reborn. As things spiral and get more and more stressful, there is a momentary scene when Hank sees so people enjoying beers and Butler captures his longing for that escape and his resolve not to pursue it without saying a word. And like only cinema can deliver, there is a happy ending where he sends the stolen drug money to his mother and escapes to Mexico. Sitting at a bar at the beach, Hank orders a club soda and turns off the Giants game on TV, no longer morning the baseball career he never had.
