OCEAN’S THIRTEEN (2007)
Directed by Steven Soderbergh

I saw “Ocean’s Eleven” when someone borrowed me his copy and I wasn’t impressed. Because there’s hardly any good films playing in the cinema I went to see “Ocean’s Thirteen” last week. This was a vast improvement.

Of course Clooney and Soderbergh have teamed up so often by now they know how to play with each other. The same goes for Clooney and Pitt. The idea behind “13″ is to show someone the Ocean gang didn’t like it that someone played a dirty trick on a friend. This gives the movie a ‘the gang is getting even’ feeling rather than ‘ooh, time to cash in again’.

One thing more, we know that Soderbergh loves switching between Hollywood movies and arthouse stuff. He did seem a bit bored here, because he tried a couple experiments out in this movie. That is not a good thing as it’s not the sort of movie that allows much experimenting. The scene where Matt Damon is followed by a handicam (all wobbly, of course) did not fit in the movie at all. Knowing when and when not to experiment is also a trade one should learn to master.

Verdict: between 6.5 and 7