Today I will be doing a spoiler-free review of Ocean’s Eleven. With all of the crime/heist movies that have been made, I feel like this one doesn’t get talked about nearly enough. In my opinion, it is the quintessential heist film, and everything about it is fantastic. I’ll start with the cast, which is absolutely loaded from top to bottom, and might be the best cast I’ve ever seen for a movie. The main character is Danny Ocean, played by George Clooney, and you have his ex-wife Tess Ocean played by Julia Roberts. Danny Ocean is planning one of the biggest heists ever on a Las Vegas casino, and he needs a massive crew. On that crew, is Linus Caldwell played by Matt Damon, Rusty Ryan played by Brad Pitt, Frank Catton played by Bernie Mac, Virgil Malloy played by Casey Affleck, Turk Malloy played by Scott Caan, Basher Tarr played by Don Cheadle, Livingston Dell played by Eddie Jemison, Saul Bloom played by Carl Reiner, and Reuben Tishkoff played by Elliot Gould. If you don’t know any of these actors, look into them and see how fantastic they all are separately. This cast alone would make any movie stellar but it definitely isn’t just the cast that makes it special. An intertwined story with fantastic directing, and also a great way of telling the story, especially in the last 30 minutes. The movie is only 1h and 56m, but it somehow doesn’t even feel that long. Some of the best pacing I’ve ever seen in a movie, as this completely flies by the entire time and there really isn’t a slow or boring spot.
The antagonist of this movie is the owner of the Las Vegas Casino that all of these characters are robbing, named Terry Benedict, played by Andy Garcia. I was a massive fan of his performance, as he wasn’t over the top at all, and he was very subtle, but that worked perfectly here. He does a great job of making you root even more for the guys committing the crime. Another thing I love about this movie is that it never really takes itself completely seriously. There are so many one liners and little comedy bits, along with Brad Pitt just eating stuff throughout the movie, that you can tell it doesn’t take itself too seriously. I was also a big fan of the score, as it just goes really well with what’s happening and makes the movie flow a lot better. The chemistry between all of the characters is something special to watch too. The back and forth between Brad Pitt and George Clooney is amazing, and Matt Damon goes perfectly with those two as well. Casey Affleck and Scott Caan bounce off each other really well while playing twins, and Carl Reiner just perfectly fits in with the entire cast.
I always rate the movies I watch and I rate them based on 10 things in the movie. Those things are: action, acting, cinematography, pacing, score, characters, ending, plot, protagonist, and antagonist. I rate all of those pieces 1-10 and then after that, I add up the scores of all 10 of them and get a total score out of 100. I gave this movie a 94/100, and like I’ve said the entire time this is just fantastic, and is easily the best heist movie I’ve seen.
