Fresh faced, extremely cool and slick  yes it's shallow but so what? Eat popcorn and enjoy

Rating: Null/10 (26 February 2002)

Freshly released from jail Danny Ocean begins to recruit key players to put together a job as daring as it is dangerous - the safe that holds the money for 3 casinos belonging to Terry Benedict. As well as splitting the $150 million between the gang, Danny also plans to steal back his ex-wife Tess who is currently dating Benedict.
The first movie wasn't exactly brilliant - only really interesting because it brought the whole rat pack together onscreen for the first time. This could have easily fallen into the same trap - trading purely on the stars' names rather than an intrinsic entertainment value. However it manages to take what worked from the original and give it a great modern shine. The story is daft of course, but it moves forward with a sort of slick illogical cleverness that appears wonderfully clever but is, of course, highly unlikely! The story unfolds in an entertaining manner, the build up is great with no dull moments as we meet the characters and find out the details of the job bit by bit.
The job itself is well handled. It is so slick that you don't mind that it couldn't possibly work in real life, but instead it just appears so clever! The romantic subplot I found to be a little redundant and I didn't think that Clooney and Roberts had good chemistry - compared to Clooney and Lopez in another great Sodenberg film `Out of Sight' where the screen crackled! However it takes up little screen time and compliments the heist quite well. Sodenberg handles the film well and doesn't allow his direction to be slick without substance - the editing is clever and Las Vegas internally and externally looks great.
Clooney is fantastic in the lead - his strength is that he has great charisma which means he doesn't have to ham it up. Instead he does his stuff but allows others to try and shine while he is comfortable with a constant warm glow. Pitt does likewise - he doesn't try to hog the glory but hangs around being smooth for most of the time. This allows Pitt and Clooney to be the two leads without taking away from the ensemble feel - they also have a good relationship going here. Roberts is OK but didn't convince me that Clooney would risk so much for her. Affleck and Cann are good in a sort of comedy double act role - they don't have a lot of scenes but they are funny. Old hands Gould (so good to see him on the big screen) and Carl Riener effortlessly steal all their scenes and Matt Damon seems happy to be on a smaller part than the other stars and has a rookie sort of role. Andy Garcia has a poor role as the bad guy and doesn't manage to bring him to life - although he does make him unlikeable when next to Clooney. However, Don Cheadle, a great actor, needs a real kicking for ruining things with a terrible cockney accent that makes Dick Van Dyke sound genuine. Happily he doesn't actually have that many lines - and he only has two scenes where he has to say more than 2 sentences at a time - but really he is just terrible. Someone please explain - why his character is English? Then someone explain - why they just didn't get an English star to play it?
Overall any criticisms against this are minor and are missing the point. It's not meant to be a classic or get Sodenberg more Oscar nominations. Instead it's a slick little package that is kept afloat by a starry cast, a cool soundtrack and a nice (if silly) plot. Sit, watch, chill, enjoy, forget.