Caught Stealing

Inviting puns galore while chronicling a former baseball star’s unlikely path to redemption, Caught Stealing isn’t a home run but nevertheless makes its way around the bases with gritty intensity.

This sturdy thriller from acclaimed director Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan) lends a throwback vibe to an otherwise generic crime saga in which stylish chases and confrontations are punctuated by outbursts of intense violence or dark humor.

Hank (Austin Butler) is a former slugging phenom who lost his opportunity at turning pro in a tragic accident that still haunts him. These days, his only connection to baseball is through his die-hard San Francisco Giants fandom he shares long-distance with his mother.

As the story opens, he’s scraping by as a bartender in New York, living alone in a rundown high-rise while entertaining regular visits from a nurse (Zoe Kravitz). Besides fulfilling each other’s physical desires, she reassures him with cautious optimism and words of wisdom. “When you run away from what you’re afraid of, then it owns you,” she cautions.

The film gradually reveals the source of his lingering guilt, grief, regret, and remorse, which might contribute to his somewhat generous nature. Trouble comes when Hank agrees to cat-sit for a drug-dealing neighbor (Matt Smith) with a massive mohawk.

Taking his responsibility seriously, Hank is lured unwittingly into confrontations with numerous eccentrics including violent Russian gangsters, an enigmatic police investigator (Regina King), Hank’s nonchalant boss (Griffin Dunne), and a pair of streetwise Orthodox fixers (Liev Schreiber and Vincent D’Onofrio) who become unlikely allies.

Providing an emotional anchor amid the chaos is Butler (Elvis), whose fully committed and richly textured performance digs beneath Hank’s brooding machismo to reveal a deep-seeded vulnerability.

The bleaker his circumstances become, the more we root for him to find a fresh start, especially compared to the periphery collection of oddballs and rogues who emerge from his relentless downward spiral.

Meanwhile, Aronofsky brings a noir-infused visual flair to the more standard-issue procedural elements in a film that meticulously captures its time and place. The screenplay by novelist Charlie Huston yields some intriguing twists amid its maze of shifting loyalties and cloudy motives.

Offering a character-driven spin on familiar genre themes, Caught Stealing feels like a side project for the versatile filmmaker that lacks polish and prestige in favor of evocative texture and scrappy tenacity.

Rated R, 107 minutes.