Ocean’s Trilogy (Eleven, Twelve, Thirteen/Warner HD-DVD)

 

Picture: B/B/B & C+     Sound: B/B/B & C+     Extras: C-     Film: C/D/C-

 

 

Remaking the Rat Pack film Ocean’s Eleven seems like an odd idea.  It was a thinly-plotted film propelled by Vegas as a character of its own, but with Steven Soderbergh on board and a good cast of big stars, the first film was a hit and Producer Jerry Weintraub had his first hit in many, many years with a remake in 2001 that was at least more watchable than his gutting of the British TV classic The Avengers.  With George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, Andy Garcia, Julia Roberts and more name stars in the cast, they had pulled off a decent comedy heist film that was watchable and should have been left at that.

 

Instead, they had to make two more films and the result is both this new HD-DVD trilogy (also issued on Blu-ray) and two of the most unnecessary sequels of all time, but what do you expect from sequels to a remake?

 

Catherine Zeta-Jones was added to Ocean’s Twelve in 2004, which made money, but was one of the worst, most condescending, idiotic, annoying, tired, sickening, smug, calculating and pompous films Soderbergh could ever make, as if he was trying to commit commercial suicide on purpose.  How about Julia Roberts’ character pretending to be Julia Roberts?  Sadly, it was a hit and amazingly as far as Weintraub was concerned, almost as absolutely awful as The Avengers.

 

The cast is far and above all this, but it must have been a quick paycheck.

 

Ocean’s Thirteen (2007) was almost as bad, but we have already covered it before in its HD-DVD/DVD Combo version, which you can read more about at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6223/Ocean

 

 

The 1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image is problematic on all three discs, though the sever redness from the final film is not as bad on the first two transfers, but it is still an issue.  The Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 on all the HD-DVDs are underperformers and sound mix so quiet, Dolby TrueHD or any DTS could not have improved the situation much.  The combination in all cases is as trying as the sequels, better than DVDs, but not by that much.  Disappointing all around is the best way to sum it up.

 

Extras on the first two HD-DVDs include audio commentaries by Soderbergh & his co-writers from each film respectively, Eleven has a cast commentary including Damon, Garcia & Pitt and a making of featurette for both films from HBO First Look.  Twelve gives us 30 minutes of additional scenes that were cut, likely so audiences would not go into mass comas.  All involved say it is over.  Let’s hope so!

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo