The Old College Try: Ocean's Thirteen

For the longest time, Ocean's Thirteen has sat, unwatched, on my shelf of movies. Sure, I loved Ocean's Eleven, but sequels? No thanks. It forced itself into my collection as a Christmas present and I had never brought myself to watch it. Can I say I was surprised? No, not really. Can I say I enjoyed it? I'd say so.

Unfortunately, Ocean's Twelve is not in my repertoire. In fact, I was a little worried that I would be lost watching a sequel to a sequel. However, with a general understanding of Ocean's Eleven, a viewer can coast through this movie with ease.


Like I said before, the movie has the same general set-up as the first. Al Pacino, who plays Willy Bank, is a well-off casino owner known for his sterling reputation in hotel management. He screwed Reuben Tishkoff, played by Elliott Gould, out of his share of the new hotel the two were building together. Since Reuben is the granddaddy, the sage, the man who taught him everything, Danny Ocean, played by George Clooney, knows he has to do something. The only difference? A few years have passed, security has gone digital and things are a little harder to sneak into. Is that going to stop them? Please.

The diverse characterization is what sucked me in to Ocean's Eleven. Essentially, that's what you get in Ocean's Thirteen: another chance to check up on Danny and the boys. They're all doing the same old things with the same skills. Going in, I knew it wasn't going to feel quite as fresh. With so much attention to detail and body language that you, as the viewer, think you know who these people are, only so much can be done. For example, Don Cheadle plays Basher, the man with the goods to shut down casinos. That's his thing. Casey Affleck and Scott Caan, on-screen brothers Virgil and Turk Malloy, do most of the running around. They get their hands dirty with little jobs while George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Matt Damon are out scheming and manipulating. In the first installment, Cheadle, Affleck and Caan have fairly small roles. Important, but small. To me, this was disappointing because the three combined had some of the funniest dialogue in the film. To see them again in different situations, despite doing the same kind of work, was worth it. I craved the extra dialogue and expansion of the minor characters because they were so likable to begin with. With larger roles this time around, I got to see their brilliant chemistry and shining moments. There's a certain magic to getting an audience genuinely hooked and interested in a fictional person and director Steven Soderbergh had it from the get-go.  

All I can say about teaming up with Terry Benedict, played by Andy Garcia, to take down Bank was "...Really?" Something didn't sit right with me that they had to team up with their previous enemy, who was willing to do anything for the man that screwed him out of millions of dollars. It was just one of those things that I had to accept and go on with. I was glad that the characters obviously weren't happy about it, but I wasn't a fan of that detail.    

SPOILER AHEAD

I'm not saying I'm a tree-huggin', carbon footprint-less, environmental extremist, but I didn't really like the measures the guys went to for revenge. Inducing an earthquake in order to rob a casino just seems wrong to me on so many levels. It made me a little sad for the earth, even if it wasn't real. As the third addition, I can understand a want and a need to pull out any stops, but messing with natural disasters was a little too much for me. 

SPOILER END


So will it knock your socks off with originality? Nah, you've seen it before. But will you be delighted to see Bernie Mac? Well, I sure was. The way the characters channel and feed off of each other was the sole reason I kept watching.

Out of four, I give it: