Ocean's Twelve

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Ocean's Twelve is a 2004 film that takes place after the events of the 2001 movie Ocean's Eleven. Like its predecessor, the film is directed by Steven Soderbergh and stars George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon. The film was released in the United States on December 10, 2004 (see 2004 in film).

In spite of extremely high box office expectations and a promising opening weekend, Ocean's Twelve was not a very big box office hit, at least not compared to Ocean's Eleven. As of April 12, 2005, the movie grossed about US$125 million while Ocean's Eleven made about $184 million in its entire box office run. Ocean's Twelve grossed $362,744,280 after its worldwide theatrical run.

The film is rated PG-13 in the US, 12A in the UK, and PG in Canada. As with the first film, there is no sex, violence or strong subject matter and it was the inclusion of a few choice sexual swear words uttered in a non-sexual context that upped the film to a more commercial rating. According to Yahoo! News, a sequel is in the works, with a working title of Ocean's Thirteen.

Cast

• George Clooney as Danny Ocean
• Brad Pitt as Rusty Ryan
• Matt Damon as Linus Caldwell
• Andy Garcia as Terry Benedict
• Julia Roberts as Tess Ocean (Danny Ocean's wife)/Herself
• Catherine Zeta-Jones as Europol detective Isabel Lahiri
• Vincent Cassel as François Toulour
• Albert Finney as LeMarque (uncredited)
• Casey Affleck as Virgil Malloy
• Scott Caan as Turk Malloy
• Shaobo Qin as 'The Amazing' Yen
• Bernie Mac as Frank Catton
• Don Cheadle as Basher Tarr
• Carl Reiner as Saul Bloom
• Eddie Jemison as Livingston Dell
• Elliott Gould as Reuben Tishkoff
• Bruce Willis as Himself
• Cherry Jones as Molly Star/Mrs. Caldwell

Plot

At the opening of Ocean's Twelve, the eleven members of Ocean's Eleven are living their lives separately off the fortunes of their Vegas casino heist in the first film. Terry Benedict (Garcia), the owner of the three casinos, confronts each member of the team in turn, demanding the team return his money, with interest. Benedict gives the team two weeks to come up with the money, which amounts to $190 million.

Ocean and the team decide to stage another heist to pay off the debt. Being too hot to work in the United States, they pick a European target: the world's oldest stock certificate in Amsterdam. Ocean's Eleven manages to breach the security around the certificate, but a rival thief, the "Night Fox" (Cassel), beats them to the document.

As it turns out, The Night Fox is the one who revealed the identities of the Eleven to Benedict. The Fox is incensed that his mentor, the retired thief Gaspar LeMarque (Finney), hailed Ocean's Eleven casino theft as one of the best thefts ever committed. The Fox breaks "rule number one" (revealing another thief's identity) in order to lure the team to Europe, where he can propose a challenge: the theft of a Fabergé egg. Both Ocean's Eleven and the Night Fox will attempt to steal the famous Coronation Egg within a week; the first to succeed will be declared the better thief. If Ocean's team wins, the Fox will pay off the team's debt. With no other options, Ocean accepts the challenge.

Meanwhile, a female Europol detective, Agent Isabel Lahiri (Zeta-Jones), hears of the increased theft activity in Amsterdam. She forges her superior's signature on a request form in order to procure enough resources to track down the Eleven. Eventually all eleven members are captured, but are released when Linus' mother, masquerading as a U.S. official, manages their extradition.

Later, at the Fox's home, he delights in explaining how he was able to steal the egg. Ocean then reveals the truth: the contest was over before it began, and the egg that Fox stole was a fake. Ocean and associate Rusty Ryan (Pitt) had previously visited LeMarque and learned the location of the real egg: traveling by courier to the museum exhibition. The team steals the egg, and replaces it with a replica, but goes through the motions of a museum heist to throw off the Fox's surveillance. The Fox is crestfallen, and Ocean gets the money that The Night Fox had given to LeMarque to hold in confidence when the competition was first proposed.

It is not until the end that the viewers realize that LeMarque was actually the mastermind behind the entire operation. By deliberately making the Night Fox feel inferior to Ocean's Eleven, he manipulates the Night Fox so that he enters into a competition with Ocean's Eleven. This is "the solution to all our problems" that he alludes to in the meeting with Daniel and Rusty. The Night Fox is the mark, and Ocean's team are essentially the pawns of LeMarque. Their task is to acquire the egg relatively simply, and then get caught. This convinces the Night Fox that he has won, although the contest is just misdirection. Another goal of LeMarque is to be re-united with his daughter, Agent Lahiri, who had thought her father had died over a decade previously, and had no idea that Le Marc was her father.

The result of the entire adventure is that Ocean's Eleven is now in the clear with Terry Benedict; the extraordinarily talented Night Fox is disgraced (both in fortune and in reputation), and LeMarque is reunited both with his daughter and with the Fabergé egg he had stolen years earlier. This illustrates the artistry of LeMarque, and why he is regarded so highly amongst those who perform the long con; unfortunately it is not well explained in the film. This is the reason LeMarque is so apologetic to Daniel and Rusty, and he claims "I'm still getting the better of you" at the end of their meeting.

The bottom line of the film is that there is a critical error of judgement by the Night Fox. The Night Fox is a conceited, but extraordinarily talented cat burglar, and thinks of the casino heist as being no more than an elaborate theft. However Ocean's team in both movies is clearly made up of con artists performing "the long con".

The Night Fox relies on his physical prowess, and possibly acquiring codes and other information by bribes or brute force. Ocean's teams, however, rely on social engineering, long-term misdirection, and confidence plays. The Night Fox, despite all of his skills, is essentially artless, and this sets him up as the mark for LeMarque and Ocean's team in this film.

Production

The filming of Ocean's Twelve took place at many locations worldwide, including:

• Chicago, United States
• Winnetka, United States
• Lake Forest, United States
• Amsterdam, the Netherlands
• Paris, France
• Monte Carlo, Monaco
• Lake Como, Italy
• Rome, Italy
• Castellamare del Golfo in Sicily

Criticism

The film was criticized for its complex plot and a final twist that negated much of the preceding action. (Alfred Hitchcock's Stage Fright received similar criticism.).

Notes/Trivia

• Matt Damon's character quotes the lyrics to the classic Led Zeppelin song "Kashmir" in a scene with George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Robbie Coltrane. The other three men say seemingly non-sensical phrases, and Matt Damon doesn't know what to say on his turn, so he quotes the song, saying, "Oh let the sun beat down upon my face, stars to fill my dream, I am a traveler of both time and space, to be where I have been."
• The sequel was based on an unproduced spec script by George Nolfi called Honor Among Thieves that was originally intended to be directed by John Woo.
• The music Benedict plays on the piano when he comes to visit Basher is called "Requiem for a Dead". It was written and performed by Andy Garcia.
• The real Coronation Egg by Carl Faberge was made in 1897 and is kept in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia. It was bought in 1979 for $2.2 million by the Forbes Magazine Collection and was on display in New York — along with eight other eggs and 180 miscellaneous articles by Carl Faberge — for 25 years. On February 4, 2004, Russian oil tycoon Viktor Vekselberg bought the whole collection back for Russia for about $90 million. The 1897 egg was valued at between $18 and $24 million. The replica seen in the film was made by the jewellers Vivian Alexander and is worth over $4,000.
• When he meets Tess at the Rome hotel, Bruce Willis asks about Danny. Julia Roberts' husband's name is Danny Moder. Linus also refers to Tess as "J-Ro".
• The laser field "dance" scene (featuring the song "Thé à la Menthe" by La Caution) is remarkably similar to a scene in 1999's Entrapment where Catherine Zeta-Jones plays the thief instead of the detective.
• One of the running jokes in the film is that other characters remark that Tess Ocean bears a striking resemblance to Julia Roberts. To take the joke further, Tess later impersonates Julia Roberts; this breaks the fourth wall, as Tess is actually played by Julia Roberts. This is brought strikingly and amusingly home when Julia Roberts, playing Tess, is complaining about the Julia Roberts role she is expected to perform and tells Matt Damon's character, Linus, "No, you're playing a role, I'm apparently playing a real person!" To take it one step further, in the film's credits, Tess Ocean is credited as having played Julia Roberts.
• This film is considered a form of metafilm. Another running joke, and an example of the metafilm idea that crosses movie boundaries is Frank's character, played by Bernie Mac, who also appears in Bad Santa as the character Gin. In both movies Bernie Mac's character likes to have his toenails manicured and painted with nail polish in nail salons.

Soundtrack

David Holmes returned to compose the music for the sequel and won a BMI award. The soundtrack album does not contain the music the Night Fox listens to as he evades the lasers. The laser field song is in fact called "Thé à la Menthe" and is performed by La Caution (see "External links" below).

Ocean's Twelve OST (Warner, December 7, 2004):

1. Ornella Vanoni - "Appuntamento" (4:35)
2. David Holmes - "$165 Million + Interest (into) The Round Up" (5:43)
3. Roland Vincent - "L.S.D. Partie" (2:59)
4. David Holmes - "Lifting the Building" (2:34)
5. David Holmes - "10: 35 I Turn Off Camera 3" (2:25)
6. Piero Umiliani - "Crepuscolo Sul Mare" (2:44)
7. David Holmes - "What R We Stealing" (3:21)
8. Dynastie Crisis - "Faust 72" (3:23)
9. David Holmes - "Stealing the Stock (into) Le Renard de Nuit" (4:53)
10. David Holmes - "7/29/04 the Day Of" (3:11)
11. Yellowhammer - "Lazy [Album Version]" (4:30)
12. John Schroeder - "Explosive Corrosive Joseph" (2:33)
13. David Holmes - "Yen on a Carousel" (3:13)
14. David Holmes - "Real Story" (2:55)
15. Dave Grusin - "Ascension to Virginity" (5:05)
16. David Holmes - "Untitled" (1:02)

Total Duration: 54:04

External links

• [Official Site]
• [}}}] at Rotten Tomatoes
• [1897 Imperial Coronation Egg by Carl Faberge]
• [the world's oldest stock certificate (VOC)]
• [Oceans Twelve Pictures and Reviews]
• [Kourtrajme Productions Site] featuring Nikkfurie de La Caution's music.
• [La Caution's Site]

Films by Steven Soderbergh
sex, lies, and videotape (1989) | Kafka (1991) | King of the Hill (1993) | Underneath (1995) | Gray's Anatomy (1996) | Schizopolis (1996) | Out of Sight (1998) | The Limey (1999) | Erin Brockovich (2000) | Traffic (2000) | Ocean's Eleven (2001) | Full Frontal (2002) | Solaris (2002) | Eros (Equilibrium) (2004) | Ocean's Twelve (2004) | Bubble (2006) | The Good German (2006) | Guerrilla (2007)

 

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