In this episode our Twin Feature is Bottle Rocket (1996) & The Mastermind (2025), as we try to define the ‘Post-Heist’ Film. In a literal sense: films that mainly take place after a heist. From a genre perspective: films that deconstruct the typical conventions of a heist movie, with characters less charismatically suave as they are idle, adrift in the socio-economic and political landscape they exist in. They are characters who don’t steal for necessity, they steal for meaning.

Sources:

Lee, D. (2014), The Heist Film: Stealing with Style. New York, NY: Columbia University Press

Hayward, S. (2006), Cinema Studies: Key Concepts. 3rd Edition. London: Routledge

Neale, S. (1980), Genre. London: BFI Publishing

Lacey, N. (2000), Narrative and Genre: Key Concepts in Media Studies. New York, NY: St. Martin's Press