In Manhattan, I saw The Only Living Pickpocket in New York, a 2026 crime thriller film written and directed by Noah Segan, a producer who has frequently worked with Rian Johnson (Johnson executive produced the film). The film stars John Turturro as Harry, an aging pickpocket and career criminal who lives in the Bronx with his wife, Rosie (Karina Arroyave), who is catatonic and unable to speak, and Harry takes care of her at home. He goes out on the subway and steals watches and wallets and cell phones from people, using sleight of hand tricks from years of experience, and brings the items to a pawn shop run by his friend Ben (Steve Buscemi), who acts as a fence for his stolen goods. Harry doesn't own a cell phone, and is more old-school in his ways, mentally belonging to a long-ago era of New York City. He often bribes and tips people with cash, like his neighbor to check in on Rosie, or a health care aide taking care of Rosie at a local center.
One night, Harry pickpockets from a young man, Dylan (Will Price), breaking into his 1969-era car and stealing his duffel bag and his wallet with a USB crypto wallet. Harry dumps the bag when he finds a gun in it, but keeps the USB card and shows it to Ben, who suggests that he take it to Frank, a fence in Chinatown who is better with electronics.
Unbeknownst to Harry, Dylan turns out to be the member of an organized crime family, and being younger and more tech-savvy, identifies Harry from street security cameras, as well as following from a tracker on the USB device. Ben's store has been ransacked, and Ben is alive, but confesses that he gave Harry's address to Dylan. Harry makes it home, and Dylan and his friends are threatening Rosie and telling Harry that he has 6 hours to get the USB card back to him. So now Harry has to retrace his steps, find where the card went since it's not at Frank's anymore, and get it back while knowing that he messed up and targeted the wrong guy.
Harry's acts as a pickpocket makes it harder for him to make a living, because lost credit cards can be instantly cancellable, and cell phones can be tracked, and people don't carry large amounts of cash on them anymore. He can steal jewelry, but Ben calls one watch "fugazy," an old New York City slang term meaning false or counterfeit, despite that Harry nicked it off of a rich businessman, and Dylan says he doesn't wear his best watches out in public.
I really liked this movie. It has a 90s indie movie feel to it, with casting of great New York actors like John Turturro, Steve Buscemi, Giancarlo Esposito as a police detective, and a lot of character actors in smaller roles, like Kelvin Han Yee as Frank. A scene with Turturro and Esposito sitting side by side on the subway together was a fun Do the Right Thing reunion, with their characters as friends instead of enemies. The movie has an old-fashioned feel of people from the outer boroughs having playful jabbings at each other's neighborhoods, like "My daughter is fine. She lives in Queens, but other than that, she's fine," or commenting on how far Harry travels between the Bronx and Brooklyn to get around.
Despite that Arroyave has no spoken dialogue, I did like how subtle expressions could be read on her face, like a hint of a smile when Harry puts on the song "Native New Yorker" and is dancing for her in their home as a fun private moment between them.
I thought that Tatiana Maslany would have a bigger role, but she's only in one scene as Harry's estranged daughter, and she makes the most of her own scene, filling in a lot of exposition over Harry being a negligent father, and showcasing her talented range in a brief moment.
I think one of the most unbelievable parts of the movie was when Harry uses a working pay phone on the NYC streets, and there aren't any current working pay phones in NYC, many have been removed and replaced by cell phone charging stations, and it made me wonder if the film was a period piece taking place in the 90s or 2000s before I saw a smartphone again.
I myself am a native Long Islander, and I lived in Manhattan for four years, then lived in Queens for sixteen years, and have now lived in Jersey City for three years. So while I have never been a native New Yorker, I still have always felt connected to the city and New York culture, and my family had roots in Brooklyn and Queens before moving to Long Island. So it felt like I got this movie, and connected well to the characters and the aspects of the less popular versions of New York City shown in the film, and it felt real and personal and well-worn.
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