Ocean's Twelve

Steven Soderbergh’s sequel deliberately breaks the promise the first film made. Ocean’s Eleven walked the audience through the mechanics step by step; here the plan is withheld until the end, then explained in retrospect. Anyone hoping to solve the vault alongside the crew spends most of the hundred and twenty five minutes uninformed. The most discussed stretch came out of a practical problem. The script was reworked once Julia Roberts learned she was pregnant with twins, and Tess became a woman impersonating Julia Roberts as part of the con, to the point where the actress speaks on the phone with her own real self. Bruce Willis turns up as himself. The film stops running a heist there and starts joking about the star system. Soderbergh shot the picture himself again under the pseudonym Peter Andrews. The European tour is not postcard work: three weeks went on the Netherlands, the Lake Como material was filmed at Villa Erba, and the camera keeps drifting rather than presenting places, separating scenes by colour filter instead. Worth it if the cast trading lines is the show for you and withholding the plan reads as part of the game. Skip it if you came for the setup, rehearsal and execution order, because this production hands you almost no preparation scenes.