Ocean's Umpteen Thirteen

Ocean's Thirteen certainly lives up to the hype and the hoopla and with panache. Avant garde work infused with the same energy of the earlier two movies in the series, this time around the suits are sleeker, dialogues are smart, tone's sardonic and all that adds up for a cool and hip movie experience. Director Steven Soderbergh exhibits great tacts as he handles the regurgitated heist theme with ease and makes the tawdry Las Vegas thoroughly entertaining.

The film opens up with our gang of sophisticated thieves brooding over the ailing member Reuben (Elliot Gould) and plot to avenge his state attributed to the offensive treatment meted out by Willie Bank (Al Pacino) who owns a casino and back stabs Reuben to push him out of a hotel partnership which leaves Reuben dilapidated.

Danny (George Clooney) negotiates with Bank, but arrogant and snobbish Bank turns him hands down and earns him the audiences mixed responses there on. So the gang plot what they do best and brace up to sabotage Bank's Vegas hotel. The main agenda is to swindle his casino of five hundred million dollars which would take the control of the hotel out of Bank's hold.

The thirteenth member joins in who is none other than Andy Garcia playing Benedict, once an arch nemesis just because of Bank's new hotel casts a shadow on his swimming pool and the plan incorporates the theft of about two hundred and fifty million dollars' worth of diamonds.

The central plot doesn't leave the set course defined by the earlier two Ocean Movies and we are treated to the hi tech gizmos, technical wizardry, twists and turns through the course and the characteristic style with which the 'boys' outsmart the rivals and the security systems. Also running is the dual identity stream which in no way muddles up the rest of the content as with the surprises there is an amazing clarity for what is going on and what is to happen (and that is a great relief after having been treated to mental agony of understanding what's going on while watching the Pirates of the Caribbean: At the world's end).

Just like the recent moral fervour prevalent in movie–dom, there are some doses sprinkled here too. The sheer audacity of the boys displayed for the heist is not because of the money involved but for the settlement of justice as they want to correct what wrong Bank did by hitting where it would hurt the most. The audience does feel and can perceive that there is moral victory through the conviction of the members and their attempts at redeeming what is lost. Al Pacino makes the character of Bank utterly loathsome. The film has a heart too as there is a labor uprising and it's resolution as well as mention of Oprah's Angel Network.

Julia Roberts' and Catherine Zeta Jones are back in latest edition though don't have much to do. Ellen Barkin takes somewhat more screen shots as Bank's right hand woman. The absence of romantic plot works for the movie as it lends the whole focus to where it should be – the men and their repertoire. The group dynamics and the sociability of the bonded group is affable and fortifies their honest intent to fight for their friend.

Character definition stick to where the second one left it and one doesn't feel like there is any need for any development (contention with less is bliss after the character development going haywire in Spiderman 3). Insecurities, general rivalries, relations among the brat pack make things appear real as having a bunch of men (thirteen in this case) and not having these would be surrealistic.

So venture out and check out the movie for the amusing, intriguing, stylishly chic entertainment infused with loyalty, collaboration, unity and if nothing else, for the 'boys' at work.