When Ocean’s Eleven was released in 2001, it became one of the most successful films of the year, creating a franchise in the process. The Steven Soderbergh-directed movie is a remake of the 1960 film by the Rat Pack (Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., and friends), and it’s one of the few films that are better than the original movies.
This is the story of Danny Ocean (George Clooney) and his crew, who are trying to steal $150 million from three different casinos, all at once, on the night of a big boxing match. The film worked so well that it had two sequels (Ocean’s Twelve and Ocean’s Thirteen) and created a universe with one spin-off, Ocean’s Eight, with Sandra Bullock playing Danny’s sister. There are rumors about a prequel where Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling will play Danny Ocean’s parents, who also have thievery in their blood. It all started with Ocean’s Eleven, and here’s why it is still the best heist movie of the 21st century.
The Heist Is Clever and Surprising
Ocean’s Eleven is one of the best American heist movies ever made, and that’s in large part because their heist is clever and surprising. Even if audiences might know that they’re going to pull it off from the start, the big question is how they’re going to do it, as one of the earlier scenes explains how protected the vault is and how good of an adversary Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) is going to be.
The script by Ted Griffin (Terriers) also has many clever moments as to how they avoid all the security pitfalls, from recording the heist in a practice vault, to posing as the SWAT team to take the money, or blowing out all the electricity of Las Vegas to avoid sensor plates. All those different moments allow for a heist where audiences are never sure what’s going to happen next.
Danny, Rusty (Brad Pitt), Linus (Matt Damon), and the rest of the crew succeed because of their combined abilities, as every team member brings their own area of expertise, creating The Avengers of heists. Getting the team together is always one of the greatest scenes in a heist film, and here, it’s no different, as audiences learn something about each character. If all that wasn’t enough, and thanks to Clooney and Pitt, the team not only steals the money, but they do it while having fun and looking as cool as ever.
An Incredible Cast
George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, Elliot Gould, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Eddie Jamison, Shaobo Qin, the late Carl Reiner, and Bernie Mac play the 11 in the title, plus Julia Roberts (in one of her best performances ever), and Andy Garcia make up a dream group of actors for any director in Hollywood. The cast of this film is incredibly famous and successful. That’s one of the many reasons audiences wanted to see the movie, as it’s not typical to see so many movie stars in just one film. The actors who appear in the film have accumulated seven Oscar wins and 22 Oscar nominations, and that’s not counting director Steven Soderbergh, who has one win and two more nominations himself.
For audiences, there’s also the appeal of watching all these movie stars having fun together, as it looks like shooting the film was as fun for them as it was for the viewers, as they’re in the joke. The script has sarcastic quips and many interactions where the team is making fun of each other, probably built from the real chemistry between the actors, who might be doing exactly that between takes.
In some cases, the film also allowed the actors to play a bit against type. Damon plays is the “little brother” that Danny and Rusty keep messing with, allowing the Bourne actor to play someone different and making it one of his best performances. The same happens with Julia Roberts. Yes, she’s the romantic interest, but her character is fully formed and has her own interests and dreams, and Clooney and her have such a romantic energy that audiences believe their love story with just a few scenes between them.
The cast came back for both sequels (Roberts didn’t appear in Ocean’s 13 as there was not enough on the page for her to play), and they even added more movie stars: Catherine Zeta-Jones, Al Pacino, Ellen Barkin, Vincent Cassel, and Bruce Willis playing himself in a very funny performance, and that’s proof that the Ocean’s team had the time of their lives playing these characters, and that the friendships the movie showed became real.
Soderbergh at the Top of His Game
Even with such an excellent group of actors, the film could be boring or a by-the-numbers heist, one of the reasons the genre had become stale and had stopped being a box office magnet. Comedic, tongue-in-cheek heist films, anyway; the violent heist film was still working in movies like Heat. Enter Steven Soderbergh; the director had started his career with a bang, directing Sex, Lies, and Videotape, but his ’90s run hadn’t been great, as he had tried too many experimental movies that didn’t work at the box office.
Things started to change with Out of Sight, where he not only worked with Clooney, but proved his stylized photography and direction could work with the right script. The next year, he directed both Traffic and Erin Brockovich, and got Best Director nominations at the Oscars for both, making him a star director and the perfect man for the job of directing Ocean’s Eleven.
The director nails the project, making it one of his best movies, with a slick direction full of sight gags, and photography that shows how beautiful Las Vegas can be at night (the fountain scene is mesmerizing to look at). His direction has some of the same fun and coolness as the actors performing in the movie, creating smooth transitions between scenes, mixing dialogue and imagery, while also playing with different styles (the flashbacks to the biggest three heists in Las Vegas history) and having creative ways of telling the story (Linus trying to escape the California Institute of Advanced Science from the point of view of those in the van), proving Soderbergh is at the top of his game.
Soderbergh has benefited from doing this franchise, as he also came back for the sequels, and that it allowed him to do more personal and experimental projects, as he could always come back to Ocean’s and make some box office hits. It also made him experiment a bit more in those sequels, especially in Ocean’s Twelve, where most of the action happens in Europe, and Soderbergh creates homages to many ’70s European movies (he has admitted in the past that the sequel is the film he likes the best, as it has more cinematic innovations).
It Has Influenced Every Heist Film Since
This film gave new life to the heist genre, and it brought many new filmmakers and actors to it, as everyone wanted to create their own version of the Ocean’s Eleven crew, where they travel around the world, every member of the team has their own abilities, and they have quippy dialogue with each other while looking good doing it. The Italian Job does it; Now You See Me does it; and even TheFast and the Furious saga does it in what might be the best film in the whole franchise, Fast Five.
Each of those films has been influenced by Ocean’s Eleven in tone, style, and cast, even though they might not look as effortless and cool doing so. Soderbergh himself came back to the genre for Logan Lucky, with a blue-collar crew that included one of the best non-James Bond performances by Daniel Craig, and that some fans renamed as Ocean’s 7/11, to remark on the similarities and differences between movies.
In the time of superheroes and IP, the heist genre has gone almost dormant, and the few stories in the genre that are released are usually either TV series (Money Heist, Kaleidoscope) or direct-to-streaming movies that try to replicate Ocean’s success with less money and style, like Kevin Hart’s Lift. The genre will come back, as it has done in the past. It will probably do so with some movie stars recruiting a crew where everyone has their own unique set of skills. That film will also show its influences, with Ocean’s Eleven being the biggest, as it is still the best heist movie of the 21st century. Rent on Amazon Video, Apple TV and Google Play Movies
