There are so many unique ingredients in Caught Stealing that it’s almost baffling that someone like Darren Aronofsky turns out a rather bland thriller that tries to be offbeat but ends up off. There are many admirable components in this New York-style stew that mix pompous Russian gangsters, mohawked English punks, and gun-toting Hasidic Jews. Despite how many bloody surprises and absurd humor Aronofsky plunks into his picture, I waited for it to veer out of the mundane lane of being a sufficient thriller.

With the book’s original author, Charlie Huston, helming the script, some unique characters are assembled. There’s a lot to the underdog protagonist of Hank (Austin Butler), a former baseball player whose future was cut short by a drunk driving accident, sending him further into a whole world of booze that can’t drown out the trauma. Life isn’t all bad for the player turned bartender, given the highly sexual relationship with his girlfriend, Yvonne (Zoë Kravitz), and his strong relationship with his mother over chatting up the New York Giants’ 1998 season. He’s reluctant to look after the cat of his traveling neighbor, the British punk Russ (Matt Smith), but he’ll do it anyway, despite his disdain for a cat that bites.

Hank’s life turns dark when some evil men sniff around Russ’s apartment. By mere proximity, he starts to lose everything, from Yvonne’s respect to his kidney. He becomes a target of cops (Regina King), Russian mobsters (Benito A Martínez Ocasio), and dressed-up Jews (Liev Schreiber, Vincent D’Onofrio) who treat running and gunning like a side gig between Mitzvahs. All of them want money that Hank doesn’t have, but slowly learns about as the criminal conspiracy gets revealed. He does all this while protecting a cat that can survive kicks, gunfire, and a car crash. The desire for filmmakers to spare animals is resonating pretty strongly in a film where so many players get brutally gunned down in the most cruel and unexpected ways.

On paper, everything sounds like it’s in place for a rousing thriller that can have some fun on its ventures around New York City. And while Aronofsky certainly does try to place a foot forward into funny, he doesn’t muster many laughs amid what could easily be a darkly comedic thriller. It’s a story that sounds good in script form, but made with the hope that the charm would just come together once the camera started rolling and everybody was in place. While this is certainly a brisk and intricate thriller, it’s not one that finds a firm footing in its manic steps between chatting baseball, getting drunk, adhering to Jewish traditions, and getting over the guilt of a life denied. This leads to an uneven spread of characters and plotlines, making it hard to care or be shocked as the body count rises in this fight for drug money.

Caught Stealing may pitch a solid character ensemble, but with this material, it spends more time bunting than hitting a home run. Perhaps the biggest twist of Darren Aronofsky’s movie is that it seems to aim for this Goldilocks zone of being not too violent but not too comical with its tale of gunfights, car chases, deception, drugs, beer, money, and baseball. The result feels like a mashed-together assortment of good scenes that don’t add up to a great movie, making me wish there was something more here to appreciate an erotically charged sex scene between Butler and Kravitz or a car chase that ends with an ice cream truck getting smashed into, highlighting a giddier picture that just isn’t here.