Convoluted to the point of ridiculousness...

Rating: 5/10 (1 August 2005)

Ocean's Twelve isn't so much a movie as it is an opportunity for the majority of the actors involved to mirror their own predominant personal behavior: pretentiousness. The "coolness" of Ocean's Eleven, prevalently displayed in the previews for the movie, turned me off to it, but I saw it at a friend's after it was released on video and ended up liking it very much. This brand of "coolness" is irritating and confusing, and though the movie can be entertaining, there are far too many subplots for us to care (or most times understand) what is occurring. The major heist involved here is clever and the dialog can be very entertaining at times, but the majority of the movie still feels like a stranger's conversation in which we are just observers. The backstories of many events are shown after the scene in which it would be essential to comprehend, and while this may seem like an original cinematic twist, it just doesn't flow.
Simply put, the movie has little of the original, tightly packed feel of Ocean's Eleven. Most everything goes wrong for the crew this time around, whereas they had an almost perfect heist in the first movie. It's an interesting switch, but it dramatically hurts the pace of the movie. I didn't dislike the movie as a whole, but I didn't particularly enjoy it either.