“Caight Stealing” criticism: No comedy by Darren Aronofsky

Deep to heavy dramas and sad individual fates, often with a horror impact: The films of the US director Darren Aronofsky (56), from “The Wrestler” to “Black Swan” to “The Whale” and “Mother!” In the case of “Caught Stealing”, some cinema goers rub themselves in astonishment.

Does the strip, in view of its rapid action and its rapidly rapid dialogues as the illegitimate film baby from Quentin Tarantino (62) and Guy Ritchie (56), actually seems from the “Requiem for a Dream” maker? Yes, he does, even if Aronofsky is apparently aware that action thrillers with humor performances are not actually his daily cinema bread.

From the cat sitter to the hunted – that's what it's about

When his punk rock neighbor asks Russ (Matt Smith, 42) to take care of his cat for a few days, Hank (Austin Butler, 33) suddenly finds himself in the middle of a colorfully mixed bunch of threatening gangsters. They all want something from him; The problem is that he has no idea what actually. While the sling is getting closer and closer, Hank is doing everything possible to stay alive long enough to find out.

Elvis, Catwoman and Prince Philip in the Zwickmühle

With “Elvis” star Austin Butler, “The Crown” mime Matt Smith and “The Batman” Antiheldin Zoë Kravitz (36) offers “Caight Stealing” an outstandingly talented cast. Especially since Hollywood greats like Vincent D’Onofrio (66), Regina King (54) and Liev Schreiber (57). According to Aronofsky, one of the most important leading roles plays the setting itself: The film act begins in the New York City towards the late 1990s and thus at a time at which the filmmaker looks back with a nostalgic look.

“The 90s were a remarkable time, an exciting time. It was much more relaxed. There was a feeling of innocence. The Soviet Union was no longer and the big scandal was Bill Clinton's extramarital affair. People were looking forward to the new millennium,” enthused Aronofsky recently in an interview with “The Guardian”. At the time, this positive energy in turn drove him as a young filmmaker to penetrate his films into dark realms – his very personal, creative counterculture. With “Caught Stealing” it is now precisely opposite: In the meantime, reality in the USA has become so frustrating and bleak that it wanted to bring something easier to get on the screen.

Funny – but no comedy

However, the director defends himself against the name of his new work as a crime comedy. So it is true that “there is more jokes in the first ten minutes than in my entire previous work. But a comedy? I don't know.” Because, like the novel, the film adaptation also has violent tips of violence.

As a result, Aronofsky does not refer to his primary mission with “Caught Stealing” to “The Guardian” as an attempt to make people laugh with it. Rather, he perceives it as a declaration of war on the fast-moving Doomscrolling era: “We are in war with the meme culture. With Tikok and Instagram stories. People's attention is no longer aimed at stories.

4 out of 5 hissing cats