Ocean's Twelve (2004) Review

"It's not in my nature to be mysterious, but I can't talk about it and I can't talk about why."

-Rusty Ryan

A few years after the first film, Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) manages to track down all 11 of the men who robbed his casino and gives them two weeks to give him back the money, plus interest: $198 million.  With few options and less time, Danny Ocean (George Clooney) and the others travel to Europe where they plan a series of heists in order to make the money.  Unfortunately, Rusty Ryan's (Brad Pitt) ex-girlfriend, Isabel Lahiri (Catherine Zeta-Jones), is a detective with Europol and is determined to stop them.  Plus a thief known as the Night Fox continuously gets in Ocean's way.

What Works:

In the first film, the cast had fantastic chemistry.  This continues into the sequel, which is an incredibly inferior film in every way, but the cast still has the chemistry and in the scenes where they actually get to talk to one another, it really shines through.

I also found the scene where the vast majority of the crew gets arrested amusing.  I wasn't expecting it and it was somewhat enjoyable.  It was a change of pace seeing everything go horribly wrong for these guys and it was easily the most interesting part of the film.

What Sucks:

This movie was utterly baffling and not it a good way.  I was so befuddled and could not figure what the hell was happening.  This movie is poorly put together and basically nonsensical.  We are given a few more pieces of the puzzle at the end, but early on in the film and I was completely flummoxed, and I felt that way not once in the original film.  The first movie gave you enough clues to figure out what was actually happening.  You probably wouldn't figure it out, but you could.  There is no way in hell you could guess what was actually going on in this film.  Far too much information is hidden from the audience.  

Early in the movie we get a montage sequence of Benedict visiting each and every member of the Eleven.  Did we need that?  No.  Give us two or three and we can cut to the whole crew gathered together.  If was a complete waste of time, adding nothing to the movie, and was totally inefficient filmmaking.  And it happens again when the crew is released from prison.  

The way this film is shot and edited is less than ideal.  The first film is very smooth, but this is just jarring.  Many scenes are boring long takes where not enough action happens to make the lack of close-ups justifiable.  Other scenes seem like they were shot from one angle.  They would have the whole team in the room, but we wouldn't see most of them.  They would be just off-screen and we would hear their dialogue.  Did they not have all the actors those days or did they just not want to get coverage?  It's really baffling and really took me out of the movie.

Finally, the 3rd act big reveal is just stupid and makes the last half of the movie a complete waste of time.  None of it mattered, it was all a big show for a really dumb reason.

Verdict:

Ocean's Twelve is an absolute dumpster fire of a film.  The cast has great chemistry and there is one amusing sequence, but the movie makes no sense, is really strangely filmed, has some really inefficient storytelling techniques, and is just...stupid.  By the time it was over, I felt like I had wasted far too much of my time watching this trash.  It's a shame because I love the first movie.  Twelve feels more like a parody than an actual sequel.

 2/10: Awful