| Ocean's Thirteen | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Steven Soderbergh |
| Produced by | Jerry Weintraub |
| Written by | Brian Koppelman David Levien |
| Narrated by | George Clooney |
| Starring | George Clooney Brad Pitt Matt Damon Andy García Don Cheadle Bernie Mac Ellen Barkin Al Pacino Casey Affleck Scott Caan Eddie Izzard Eddie Jemison Shaobo Qin Carl Reiner Elliott Gould |
| Music by | David Holmes |
| Cinematography | Steven Soderbergh |
| Editing by | Stephen Mirrione |
| Studio | Village Roadshow Pictures |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. Pictures |
| Release date(s) | June 8, 2007 |
| Running time | 114 minutes, 122 (Director's Cut) |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $85,000,000 |
| Box office | $311,312,624 |
Ocean's Thirteen is a 2007 crime comedy film directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring an ensemble cast. It is the third and final film[1] in the Soderbergh series following the 2004 sequel Ocean's Twelve and the 2001 film Ocean's Eleven, which itself was a remake of the 1960 Rat Pack film Ocean's 11. All of the cast members reprised their roles from the previous installments except for Julia Roberts and Catherine Zeta-Jones. Al Pacino and Ellen Barkin joined the cast as their new targets.
Filming began in July 2006 in Las Vegas and Los Angeles, based on a script by Brian Koppelman and David Levien.[2] The film was screened out of competition at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.[3] It was released on June 8, 2007 in the United States[4] and in several countries in the Middle East on June 6.[5]
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Reuben Tishkoff (Elliott Gould), in an attempt to legitimize himself in his later years, is conned by his business partner and ruthless businessman Willy Bank (Al Pacino). When Bank forces Tishkoff to sign over the ownership rights of the new hotel/casino they were building together, Reuben suffers a heart attack and becomes bed-ridden. Danny Ocean (George Clooney), after attempting to negotiate with Bank, gathers up his partners-in-crime and plans to completely ruin Bank on the night of the opening of the casino, "The Bank", as a way to get revenge for Reuben.
They decide to do so in two ways. First, they plan to prevent Bank's new hotel from winning the prestigious Five Diamond Award from the Royal Review board, which Bank has won four times before for other casinos. Saul Bloom (Carl Reiner) poses as the reviewer of the board, while the real reviewer (David Paymer), who proclaims himself to be a Very Unimportant Person, is treated poorly during his stay through Ocean's associates and the staff of the hotel on their payroll.
The second plan is to rig the casino's slot machines and other gambling games to force the hotel to pay out more than $500 million in winnings; this will force Bank to cede control of the hotel to his board. Rigging of the games would require them to defeat "The Greco", a state-of-the-art artificial intelligence system that monitors the games. They plan to trick Bank into carrying a cell phone with a magnetron, created by technical expert Roman Nagel (Eddie Izzard), to disrupt the Greco. To assure that players cash out, Ocean's team acquires one of the giant drills used to bore the Channel Tunnel to simulate an earthquake under the hotel on its gala opening night.
While the group prepares the rigged games, they run into problems when the drill fails. Ocean is forced to approach his nemesis Terry Benedict (Andy García) to fund the purchase of the second drill. While Benedict has a grudge against Bank and is willing to help, he only offers Ocean the funds if they also steal the four necklaces Bank has purchased to celebrate winning the Diamond Awards, now on display in a secured case at the top level of the hotel. Ocean plans for Linus Caldwell (Matt Damon) to seduce Bank's assistant, Abigail Sponder (Ellen Barkin), to gain access to the display and switch the diamonds with fake ones.
As Ocean's plan proceeds on opening night, agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation have been tipped off that machines have been rigged by Livingston Dell (Eddie Jemison), and have identified Livingston, which may reveal the rest of Ocean's gang to Bank. Basher (Don Cheadle) distracts Bank long enough to allow the gang to change the FBI records. Livingston is arrested by the lead agent, but is surprised to discover he is Linus's father, Bobby (Bob Einstein),is in on Ocean's plan and there to help Linus swap the diamonds. As they exit to the roof of the hotel for extraction via helicopter, they are caught by François "The Night Fox" Toulour (Vincent Cassel), whom Benedict had ordered to intercept the diamonds. Linus hands over the diamonds to Toulour, who leaves, but discovers too late he only holds the fakes; Ocean had been aware of Toulour's presence, and arranged to extract the entire display case from the hotel with the helicopter.
The remainder of Ocean's plan continues as expected, with the Greco disrupted, and guests leaving the hotel with their bountiful winnings. As Bank realizes his ruin, Ocean lets him know that they did everything for Reuben. The group uses the money they made off with to buy property north of the Las Vegas Strip for Reuben to build his own casino. As punishment for Benedict's treachery, Ocean donates his portion of the take to charity, forcing Benedict to publicly admit his philanthropy. As the group disperses on their own and considers settling down, Rusty ensures that the Very Unimportant Person is compensated by allowing him to win an $11 million jackpot at a rigged slot machine at the airport.
Julia Roberts and Catherine Zeta-Jones did not appear in their roles as Tess Ocean and Isabel Lahiri due to script issues,[6] their absence being explained by Danny, who repeatedly states "It's not their fight."
The film did well on its first weekend, reaching the top spot at the North American box office. Despite being opened in 250 more theaters than Ocean's Twelve, it had a slightly weaker opening weekend than the former, pulling in $36 million, compared to Twelve's $39 million opening weekend.[7][8] By the end of December 2007, Ocean's Thirteen had generated $311.4 million in box office revenue worldwide.[9]
Critical reception to the movie has been more positive than its predecessor with some critics liking the movie's style while others criticized it for being overly complex. Joel Siegel, in what would turn out to be his last review for Good Morning America, stated that if it had been the first movie, there still would have been a sequel. On the movie website Rotten Tomatoes, the movie has received an overall 70% score, and a top critics score of 58%.[10] In his review for New York, David Edelstein wrote, "As the plotting gets knottier, his technique gets more fluid—the editing jazzier, the colors more luscious, the whip-pans more whizbang. It’s all anchored by Clooney, looking impudent, roguish, almost laughably handsome".[11] Manohla Dargis, in her review for The New York Times, wrote, "Playing inside the box and out, he has learned to go against the grain while also going with the flow. In Ocean’s Thirteen he proves that in spades by using color like Kandinsky and hanging a funny mustache on Mr. Clooney’s luscious mug, having become a genius of the system he so often resists".[12] However, Roger Ebert wrote, in his review for the Chicago Sun-Times, "Ocean's Thirteen proceeds with insouciant dialogue, studied casualness, and a lotta stuff happening, none of which I cared much about because the movie doesn't pause to develop the characters, who are forced to make do with their movie-star personas".[13] Peter Bradshaw, in his review for The Guardian, wrote, "Sometimes we go to split-screen, and sometimes - whooaaa! - two of the split-screen frames are funkily showing the same thing. It is all quite meaningless. As if in an experimental novel by BS Johnson, the scenes could be reshuffled and shown in any order and it would amount to the same thing. There is no human motivation and no romance".[14]
Ocean's Thirteen was released on DVD in November 2007.[15]
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