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Third “Oceans” Film Gets By On Cool |
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Written by ALAN SIMONIS
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Tuesday, 12 June 2007 |
Moviegoers are finding themselves swimming in a sea of threes this summer- from Spider-Man and Pirates to Shrek; it’s enough to want the studios to come up with a “three strikes and you’re out” law. Into this ocean of act threes sails “Oceans Thirteen”, which, thanks to some crafty numbering, is the third film in that series as well.
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“Oceans Thirteen”
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 Entertainment
 Art
Rated: PG-13
Released on June 8, 2007
Directed by: Steven Soderbergh
Written by: Brian Koppelman and David Levien
Starring: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Al Pacino
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Like the previous two Oceans films, “Thirteen” is roughly modeled on the Rat Pack’s original film “Oceans Eleven.” They all follow the basic premise of a band of mismatched hustlers joining up to pull a massive heist at a casino. In this installment, Danny Ocean (George Clooney), Rusty Ryan (Brad Pitt), et al take on ruthless developer Willy Bank (Al Pacino), after Bank pulls a fast one on Oceans team member Reuben Tishkoff (Elliott Gould), and puts him in the hospital. From there the boys decide to get back at Bank, and ruin the opening of his new casino.
To be honest, I’m not sure if I ever fully understood all the details of their scheme. Most of the heist is pretty straight-forward: I could figure out the part where they impersonate a casino critic and how they’ll rig the games. On the other hand, there’s so much lingo flying around that I did feel like I missed… something. Specifically, Ocean and crew have developed this “cockney rhyming slang” style vocabulary involving popular figures. Apparently “Billy Martin” means a second chance; beyond that, I’m clueless.
Then again, the whole movie is kind of like that. Unlike the other summer “part three” films, “Thirteen” does very little to inform the audience of the past two entries- they just kind of throw you in there. In retrospect, the plots to the previous films don’t really matter, just as the story for this one is largely superfluous as well. These films run on pure, unleaded cool- as long as that is working, the rest doesn’t make much difference.
With “Thirteen” that is largely the case- the stars give the performances one would expect from actors having fun making a breezy summer caper flick, and their enjoyment shows through to the audience. There are some problems with the film- “The Oprah Winfrey Show” could be considered the third most prominent female presence, meaning “Thirteen” is somewhat lacking in ladies. However, all in all “Oceans Thirteen” is a movie that may not be greater, but is at least not less, than the sum of its parts. Powered by AkoComment 2.0! |
