Trailer Breakdown: Caught Stealing
Austin Butler and Zoe Kravitz from the film “Caught Stealing” / Sony Pictures Entertainment
When a new trailer drops, most people talk about the plot, the cast, or the action beats—but I like to dig a little deeper. In my breakdowns, I focus on the emotional pulse: the core feeling the trailer is designed to provoke, and how that aligns—or sometimes misaligns—with the genre tags advertised on IMDb.
Today I’m looking at Caught Stealing, a high-stakes crime thriller adapted from Charlie Huston’s novel, and unpacking not just what it shows us, but what it makes us feel. If you’re a storyteller, filmmaker, or screenwriter, this is where craft meets audience impact—and here’s how.
IMDB genre tags
ACTION
COMEDY
CRIME
THRILLER
In the Writer Igniter Emotional Genres, that translates to the Emotional Pulses of:
EXCITEMENT
JOY (AMUSEMENT in particular)
MORAL TENSION (Does not appear to be active in this trailer)
FEAR (Thriller = ANXIETY in particular)
LOGLINE:
Burned-out ex–baseball player Hank Thompson (Austin Butler) unexpectedly finds himself embroiled in a dangerous struggle for survival amidst the criminal underbelly of 1990s New York City, forced to navigate a treacherous underworld he never imagined.
Now the question:
When you watch this trailer, do EXCITEMENT and ANXIETY dominate your emotional experience? Or does the dark AMUSEMENT rise up just as strongly?
Comment below!
Here’s the trailer:
If watching this makes you dream about writing something just as gripping, let’s talk. I spend my time helping writers sharpen their skills and find the most effective way to tell the stories only they can write—and I’m always glad to connect.
