Ocean's Eleven (2001)
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
Less than 24 hours into his parole, charismatic thief Danny Ocean is already rolling out his next plan: In one night, Danny's hand-picked crew of specialists will attempt to steal more than $150 million from three Las Vegas casinos. But to score the cash, Danny risks his chances of reconciling with ex-wife, Tess.
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9 films that influenced Ocean's Eleven
What critics say influenced Ocean's Eleven
The Melville picture was remade twice as " Ocean's Eleven ," and echoes of the Dassin can be found from Kubrick's " The Killing " to Tarantino's " Reservoir Dogs ."
Adapted from Auguste Le Breton's pulp novel "Du Rififi Chez Les Hommes" - the word rififi is underworld slang, approximately translating as pitched conflict - it's one of cinema's seminal heist movies, its central robbery sequence influencing the likes of "Mission: Impossible" and "Ocean's Eleven".
It's a low-rent version of The Sting, lacking deep characters to emotionally invest in, or a death to see avenged.
* Imagine Ocean's Eleven becoming the second-highest grossing film of 2001, on the way to trumping A Beautiful Mind at the Oscars.
The Sting also starred two matinee idols with Paul Newman and Robert Redford.
The Sting is full of the accomplished ease and white-toothed star power that Steven Soderbergh successfully captured in Ocean’s Eleven (the charms and payoffs of which owe far more to Hill’s film than the Rat Pack original).
Heavy on style and boasting the kind of across-the-board ensemble cast that rivals It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World for sheer star power, this is Soderbergh flexing his pure-entertainment muscles, creating a heady, goofy zone of straight artifice and sporadic comedy.
She's hasn't played a character this strident and charmless since "Mary Reilly," and she's never been photographed quite so unflatteringly.
Okay, Tess does look like Julia Roberts, but even that doesn�t matter much, since Roberts hasn�t been photographed this unflatteringly since Mary Reilly.
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Steven Soderbergh's 2001 take on the film boasts a cast similarly bursting with megawatt star power: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Andy Garcia, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle (who coincidentally played Davis in HBO's "The Rat Pack"), and Julia Roberts, for a start.
Instead, I kept wondering “What about Bob?” because pickpocket Caldwell is selected because “Bob” vouches for him.
There isn't a sour note in the bunch, headed by Clooney and Pitt, and marked by several notable stand-outs: Garcia rebounds nicely after several years' stagnation, and the criminally unappreciated Don Cheadle steals the show as Ocean's cockney explosives expert (his near-indecipherable dialect is a tip of the hat to Soderbergh's The Limey).
Split screens, wipes and slow motion--also prevalent in Soderbergh's other recent crime movies "The Limey" and "Out of Sight"--recall an earlier, edgier period of filmmaking.
Now that director Steven Soderbergh has established himself as a Prestigious and Important American Director with his message films Erin Brockovich and Traffic , he can get back to making the same top-notch entertainments that we loved him for in the first place, like Out of Sight and The Limey .
And in terms of structure and style, both "The Limey" (1999) and "Out of Sight" (1998) were much better movies.
Also lending their talents in lively performances large and small are Julia Roberts as Danny Ocean's defensively caustic ex-wife, Andy Garcia as the iron-fisted casino owner and Robert's current flame, and Don Cheadle as a Welsh crook who confuses everyone with his native rhyming slang (an insider nod to Soderbergh's awesome 1999 crime flick "The Limey" ).
We've seen it all before countless times and, unfortunately, even an extraordinary director like Mr. Soderbergh (falling back on familiar tricks, better used in "Out of Sight" and "The Limey") and a cast of A-listers can't make it fresh again.
Soderbergh's "Ocean's Eleven" is a remake of Lewis Milestone's 1960 heist comedy "Ocean's 11," starring Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. and Angie Dickinson.
However, rather than sit on his laurels waiting for his next prestige picture (unlike, say, a certain Mr Cameron), for his follow-up film Soderbergh has instead decided to round up several of his mates and re-make an iconic if-not-actually-all-that-good film from 1960 – Ocean’s 11, the original of which was the first Rat Pack movie and starred Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jnr etc.
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Alright, "Batman & Robin" was lackluster, and he's made a few other ho-hum movies, but lately he's been on a roll, working with the likes of David O' Russell, the Coen brothers and, of course, Steven Soderbergh, for whom he first starred in "Out of Sight".
Now that director Steven Soderbergh has established himself as a Prestigious and Important American Director with his message films Erin Brockovich and Traffic , he can get back to making the same top-notch entertainments that we loved him for in the first place, like Out of Sight and The Limey .
Alas, of his five films since 1998 � the others being Out of Sight, The Limey, Erin Brockovich and Traffic � Ocean's Eleven is his flimsiest and most forgettable.
Movie fans also might justifiably complain that the new film has less to do with Sinatra and the old "Ocean's Eleven" than it does the 1998 Soderbergh-Clooney heist movie, "Out of Sight."
And to think, he was almost run out of town right before he made "Out of Sight."
Split screens, wipes and slow motion--also prevalent in Soderbergh's other recent crime movies "The Limey" and "Out of Sight"--recall an earlier, edgier period of filmmaking.