Easy money

Rating: 7/10 (13 December 2001)

Danny Ocean and his co-conspirators are looking to do the impossible. They're not even as careful as they should be about it. They want to see just how far they can push their luck. So it's appropriate that the establishment they are knocking over is a casino (actually, three casinos that share one ridiculously secure vault).
Steven Soderbergh is trying to continue a streak of great directorial efforts, to give us an encore after winning an Academy Award. To do it, he's assembled a cast that reads more like a producer's wish list. Soderbergh got all of 'em. Knocking over three casinos in one night? Impossible. The guy responsible for two out of five Best Picture nominees last year making a movie that people will want to watch starring Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, and Matt Damon? Well heck, that's just easy. Whether it's good or not is a different proposition and, perhaps, a moot one.

The film takes no time to explore what's at stake for any of the eleven, except Ocean himself. Each man's take is not that much in movie terms, roughly $13.6 million. So why risk it? Even exploring the lives of three of four characters would have sufficed. So I guess they just want money. For what? Well, because--the house always wins. Elliott Gould's character, when the idea is proposed to him, tells Ocean he'll need a crew just as crazy as he is. So assemble he does, many crazy fellows. But what exactly makes them so crazy? Why are they selected? Soderbergh didn't want to spend too much time on assembling the group, so he had to leave much crucial information out. And it hurts.
Not that Soderbergh and HIS crew don't put on a good show anyway. He's brought several actors together who are used to carrying films by themselves and asked them to play minor character roles. Budget plummets, net profits soar. This move should represent something very positive in the filmmaking community--the idea that acting is fun and work is work (though even the reduced rate each A-lister here was paid is more than the average American makes in ten lifetimes). The problem is they risked nothing. This film could not miss. Everyone involved is obviously having a blast, but the film never finds a soul. It's too busy being cool and clever.
So cool is "Ocean's Eleven" in fact, that I missed that there's barely a curse word, no sex, no violence. Nil. A caper movie like this typically has plenty of each, but not this. Not that Soderbergh seems to be necessarily avoiding them. These things that are meant to add something to films--sex, violence, profanity--are like a subject in a conversation that just never comes up.
Soderbergh shoots this one himself, as he did with "Traffic." I wonder how much the guy actually directed on this one. With this kind of acting talent, who tries to direct? Even before he won his Best Director Oscar, he was probably thinking about a project in which he could be mostly a cameraman. That's why "Eleven" falls far short of "Traffic," "The Limey," and "Out of Sight." But then, you can't hit one out of the park every time you step up to the plate.
Grade: B-