25 Greatest Film Deaths This Century

Darren Aronofsky threw a curveball this year with black comedy crime caper Caught Stealing, abandoning his usual obsession with extreme and transgressive stories that unpick complex character psyches for something more conventional. Caught Stealing places us in NYC’s Lower East Side in the late '90s, with baseball player turned bartender Hank Thompson (Austin Butler).

Hank’s life is turned upside down when shady figures from across the city come knocking on his door looking for his punk neighbour Russ (Matt Smith). It seems Russ has vanished owing a lot of money to a lot of dangerous people, including the Russian mob, the police, and Hasidic hitmen Lipa and Schmully Drucker (Liev Schreiber and Vincent D’Onofrio), and they all hold Hank personally liable. This leads to several beatings, killings, and the sudden murder of Hank’s girlfriend Yvonne (Zoe Kravitz).

While for much of the film it is unclear who exactly killed Yvonne, Hank comes to believe it was corrupt PD Elise Roman (Regina King) and cuts a deal with the Druckers to kill her. After the fact, however, when Hank is driving them to collect Russ’s money, and all seems well, Lipa pulls out Yvonne’s cigarette lighter.

Thus, Hank hits the gas and recreates the traumatic car crash that put him out of pro baseball in the first place, sending the Druckers to Gehinnom via the minivan windscreen. This double kill is set up, played through, and paid off perfectly in one of the most narratively satisfying death scenes this century.