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Shelf Beauties
by Willie Waffle
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Ocean's Thirteen
The gang is back for a third
caper film, but is the magic and fun still there? At times, it is, but the picture still has the coolest
music you will hear in movies, even when Ocean's Thirteen is plodding along.
Danny (George Clooney),
Rusty (Brad Pitt), Linus (Matt Damon) and the rest of Ocean’s team of con men
have decided it’s time to reunite to help support one of their own. Rueben (Elliott Gould) is in the hospital in
a coma due to the shock and pain of being double crossed by hated Vegas tycoon
and casino entrepreneur Willy Banks (Al Pacino). So, Danny and the team have devised a plan to
get revenge by bankrupting Banks’s casino via rigging it so everyone will win
during a 3-minute period and ruining the villain’s reputation by causing
havoc all over, but they face challenges posed by new technology and an uneasy alliance
with their hated nemesis, Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia).
Can Danny and the gang pull
off the scheme?
Overall, the movie is OK
enough. Ocean’s Thirteen gets back to
the glitz and glamour of Vegas, but doesn’t have the energy,
excitement and fun of the first film, Ocean’s 11. It’s still funny, and has some hilarious
moments, but director Steven Soderbergh and the cast all seem to be going
through the motions.
We get lots of silly
disguises to make you chuckle as these superstar thespians suffer ignominy (and seem happy to do it) for our easy laugh, but the dialogue from writers Brian Koppelman and David Levien lacks
the pep and color of the previous two movies.
Interaction between the different members of the grandiose plan lack the
fun and pleasure they seemed to be having before. Yes, this movie is about revenge, so it is
darker, but the rest of the movie never gets all that dark, so why shouldn’t
the dialogue be lighter?
Worst of all, Soderbergh,
Koppelman and Levein never let us feel like Danny, Rusty, Linus and the rest
are in danger, or Banks is up to deflecting their challenge. Sure, we know they will somehow win in the
end (it is a movie after all), but it feels too easy to be believable or raise
the tension needed to engross us in Ocean’s Thirteen and make us worry for our
heroes. Everyone is too laid back and
too cool to break a sweat, when some sweating would be interesting. Even worse, the story is not as focused on
the big scheme, not as detailed and Koppelman and Levein fill the film with lots of little
distractions, which can be funny, but never make a serious contribution to the
story or plot.
Fans
will find something to like, but you are better off watching Ocean’s 11, the
one with Clooney or the one with Sinatra.
2 Waffles (Out of 4)
Ocean's Thirteen is
rated PG-13 for brief sensuality
Copyright
2007 - WaffleMovies.com
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