Ocean’s Eleven

I have a theory about this movie. Every time I tell my theory to someone, they cough uncomfortably and roll their eyes as soon as they’re out of my sight. Well, Greg didn’t, but I don’t know him well enough to discern if he was just humoring me or not.

Anyway.

My theory is that Ocean’s Eleven is the best Hollywood blockbuster movie produced in years and that all Hollywood blockbusters should follow in its footsteps. Most Hollywood films try too hard (We’re supposed to care about the romance between Liv Tyler and Affleck in Armageddon? Bring on the asteroid!) or hit the audience over the head with cheap humor or heavy metaphor (Seabiscuit was particularly heavy-handed) or have absolutely no style at all. Ocean’s Eleven is a reasonably smart movie (it’s not cerebral, but it doesn’t pander either), entertaining, and thanks to Soderbergh’s direction and a good soundtrack, it’s got great style too. And it never resorts to sex or violence to score cheap points with the audience. (I could go on and on…)