Ocean’s Thirteen (2007)

Directed by: Steven Soderbergh | 122 minutes | thriller, comedy, crime | Actors: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Ellen Barkin, Al Pacino, Bernie Mac, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Elliott Gould, Shaobo Qin, Don Cheadle, Eddie Jemison, Andy Garcia, Scott L. Schwartz, Carl Reiner

Despite his friends, including Danny Ocean (George Clooney), warning him of the ruthless practices of Willy Bank (Al Pacino), Reuben Tishkoff (Elliott Gould) still does business with the miscreant. He thinks Bank won’t cheat on him after all, but in a cold and hard-hitting manner, Bank shatters all of Tishkoff’s hopes of a profitable retirement provision in a few minutes of conversation. A very scary Al Pacino, dressed in an equally scary suit and with fake teeth that give you the shivers, humiliates Reuben in a gruesome way. Danny Ocean gathers his old buddies. In the six months prior to the grand opening on 3 July, the super-deluxe hotel annex mega casino ‘The Bank’ is already running a trial. This gives the group plenty of time to work on getting revenge for Reuben on multiple fronts. They even try to create a fake earthquake to temporarily paralyze ‘The Bank”s state-of-the-art security system by digging under ‘The Bank’ with a huge drill. But due to the many expensive preparations, none of them has the necessary money to continue the work. The only one who can help them is their former enemy Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia). He would like to participate, but sets his own conditions.

‘Ocean’s Thirteen’ is pleasantly reminiscent of ‘The Sting’ (1973). Here too, cheaters and swindlers join forces to ingeniously avenge the suffering inflicted on one of them. They want to financially strip the culprit as much as possible, but above all hit where it hurts the most. Here too there are many nice twists in the plot and togetherness is more important than personal gain. But in contrast to ‘The Sting’, the attack is deployed on many more fronts simultaneously, resulting in fragmentation that often does not help the pace of the film.

The various parts are very witty, such as Virgil Malloy (Casey Affleck) causing a revolt among Mexican workers for better wages and working conditions at the factory where the dice are made that will be taken to the casino of ‘The Bank’ and to be edited by him in a special way. His brother Turk (Scott Caan) is sent to bring him to his senses, but in no time Turk is also on the barricades to fight the social injustice that takes place there. ‘Ocean’s Thirteen’ is a pleasant, mild film about cool, smart thugs with a heart of gold. Entirely in keeping with the strong togetherness of the scammers among themselves, the actors are very generous towards each other and give each other plenty of space. The technical gadgets and the many problems with just as many smart solutions are very nice. Great entertainment.