Eleven guys get together in Vegas
to pull a con and walk away with over $150 million in cash…and a little
something extra.
I have this on Blu-ray.
Starring:
…from Facts
of Life, a guest spot in Golden
Girls, ER, and the worst Batman movie ever made.
…from guest spots in 21 Jump Street
…from The
Original Kings of Comedy, and The
Bernie Mac Show.
…from The
Last Flight of Noah’s Ark and the other
medical show called E/R from
1984…which also co-starred Clooney.
…from Good
Will Hunting; brother of Daredevil, brother-in-law of Elektra.
…from the Hawaii
Five-O series remake; Sonny Corleone’s eldest son.
…from the Bud Light commercials.
…from Boogie
Nights, and (is the better James Rhodes in) Iron Man 2.
…from outta nowhere.
…from The
Dick Van Dyke Show and Dead Men Don’t
Wear Plaid.
… from Saving
Private Ryan and Mystic Pizza.
…from Pretty
Woman and Flatliners.
and
…from The
Untouchables and Black Rain.
Notes of Interest:
1) Ocean’s Eleven
was released on December 7, 2001 …one
week after Behind Enemy Lines, one
week before Vanilla Sky, two weeks
before Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship
of the Ring and three weeks before Kate
and Leopold and Monster’s Ball.
2) It wound up being the eighth top grossing film of the
year, making more than Jurassic Park III
and less than Pearl Harbor .
3) The estimated budget on this film was $85 million…which
was earned back by December 28, 2001
(3 weeks later).
4) When this film was released:
George Clooney was 40
Brad Pitt was 37
Bernie Mac was 44
Elliot Gould was 63
Casey Affleck was 26
Scott Caan was 25
Shabo Qin was 19
Carl Reiner was 79
Matt Damon was 31
Don Cheadle was 37
Eddie Jemison was 38(ish, because his D.O.B. is a mystery)
Andy Garcia was 45
Julia Roberts was 34
and
Director Steven Soderbergh was 38
5) Brad Pitt was married to Jennifer Aniston at this time,
which is significant because in the commentary with Andy Garcia and Matt Damon,
Pitt mentions a ring he’s wearing that was given to him by his wife. Looking at
the ring, it doesn’t strike me as Angelina Jolie’s style.
6) There’s a great
mash-up video putting the audio of the trailer to clips from The Great Muppet Caper. Check it out.
7) Remember the guys from MST3K? They’re still making film
commentaries, which you can buy from their website, and there’s one for Ocean’s Eleven.
8) There’s also a copy of the script dated 5-31-01 available to download. It’s
not the final draft, but anyone interested in film scripts (like me) would get
a kick out of it.
9) I’m pretty sure Emmit’s Pub (the bar where Daniel meets
Linus) is the same bar Harrison Ford heads to in The Fugitive after the St. Patrick’s Day Parade.
WTF? Moment: First
of all, every movie I like enough to buy has what I call a “draw”. Not the draw
that makes me want to see it, because most movies have that…it’s called marketing. I’m referring to the thing
that draws me into the film, making
me want to be a part of it.
The draw for Ocean’s
Eleven is Rusty Ryan, Brad Pitt’s character. Every time I watch this film,
I want to be Rusty, not Daniel. Rusty is the guy that brings Danny’s idea into
being. He’s the second-in-command, running the show from behind the scenes. He
even plays a con on another member of the crew. He’s awesome.
Plus – he’s always eating…and good stuff too.
WTF? Moment #2: My
wife’s parents listened to Elvis all the time while she was growing up. She knows
every song and has a few favorites. She once asked me when we were dating if I
had one. Twenty-three years later I did. “A Little Less Conversation” is fantastic.
WTF? Moment #3: Speaking
of the soundtrack, it features dialogue from each of Ocean’s eleven…except
Basher. Guess the accent really was
that bad.
WTF? Moment #4: The
most common gaffe I’ve read is the one saying that Mr. Walsh was in the
security room with Saul at the same time he was escorting Frank out of the
casino. There’s an easy explanation for this…they’re twins. Why wouldn’t Benedict hire twin brothers as
managers for two of his three casinos? That way, there’d always be someone to answer when he screamed “WALSH” at the top of
his lungs.
WTF? Moment #5: Another flub involved Rusty’s voice on the phone with Tess and Benedict. He called the
phone Danny planted on her at the restaurant. When she answered, and Benedict
asked who it was, we heard Rusty’s regular voice. When Benedict entered the
security room and checked his monitors, we heard a disguised Rusty voice. But,
from when Walsh handed Benedict the dollar amount in his vault through the rest
of the conversation, we heard Rusty’s regular voice again.
Here’s how it happened… Danny gave Tess a cheap-ass phone
with lousy reception. The bars were low, and it took a while for them to come
back after Benedict entered the security room. Once they did, Rusty’s voice was
heard loud and clear.
WTF? Moment #6: While
we’re at it, let’s talk about the heist itself…starting with the number of vans
they bought. My understanding is that they bought two – one for the robotic
driver, while the other was converted into the S.W.A.T. vehicle (because face
it, where can anyone buy a S.W.A.T.
vehicle?). But the power outage threw a monkey in the wrench, and Basher ended
up destroying the van with the pinch.
So where did the other
white van, the one driven robotically, come from? My guess is that during the
day-long drive to (or from) California ,
Frank re-visited Denham’s auto lot for another “deal”.
WTF? Moment #7: Now,
about Benedict’s vault. One of the problems the team faced was the security set
up within the room itself. There were floor sensors that Yen had to jump over
to get to the door to sets the charges. Why couldn’t Yen just wait until the
power went out and then walk over to
the door? He couldn’t, because there’s
no emergency lighting in there and he wouldn’t have been able to see where he
was going (even though he could have
practiced that in the dummy vault). But wait…what about giving him a glow-stick
like the ones Danny and Linus used? There wasn’t room…see next WTF Moment.
Not only that, once the power came back, the sensors were
back online right? So what happened when the door blew? Wouldn’t that have activated the floor sensors?
No, because there would be a lag time between the power coming back and the
sensors re-activating…the same way a computer needs time to start up after
being turned on. Like Saul would say, “Everyone knows this.”
WTF? Moment #8: The
appearance of the hooker flyers in the van. This one’s easier to explain than
you might think.
I saw a great film once where Michael Caine played a
Scotland Yard detective trying to track down Jack the Ripper. I can’t think of
the name right now but in it, Caine threw some water on the floor and asked
another officer how much liquid he thought there was. The officer guessed
“somewhere near a liter”, and Caine replied “two pints…I measured it myself.”
Paper’s the same way – less looks like more.
My point is that the fliers are already in the phony cash
box along with Yen, and they used that
paper to fill the bags…which is why you can see some on the vault floor when
Benedict looks for the Bellagio engraving later.
The problem though would be weight. The three guards
carrying the “X” marked bags would have to believe
they’re carrying roughly $80 million to the waiting van. Well, odds are the
guards don’t have experience carrying that kind of money, plus the guys have a whole vault’s worth of stuff
to fill the bags with to make them feel right.
WTF? Moment #9: Couple
of nit-picks about the Blu-ray: There’s no cool visual while the disc loads,
and you can’t make bookmarks. This sucks.
Know what else sucks? The extras are in Standard Definition.
WTF? Moment #10:
For the record, they drop the F-bomb in this film…twice…and get away with a
PG-13 rating.
WTF? Moment #11: Hey
you…YEAH, YOU…the guy sitting in front of Pitt and Clooney when they’re at the
circus watching the Amazing Yen…STOP LOOKING AT THE CAMERA…you’re in a crowd
scene with Pitt and Clooney, trust me, NO ONE IS LOOKING AT YOU!!!
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