Movie Breakdown: Ocean’s 8

Pre-Screening Stance:

Gary Ross (Seabiscuit, The Hunger Games) is an OK director and in general I like the cast here, but nothing about Ocean’s 8 seems all that enticing.  Here’s hoping it isn’t just a spinoff that no one asked for.

Post-Screening Ramble:

Ocean’s 8 is Ocean’s 11, but it’s not as well made or near as entertaining.  The film essentially starts the same way as its predecessor – Debbie Ocean (Sandra Bullock) convinces a parole board to let her out of prison, and then when released she promptly visits her #2, Lou (Cate Blanchett), and unveils a plan to steal a diamond necklace worth 150 million bucks.  The idea seems crazy, but Lou – of course – is in, so her and Debbie go about assembling a group of talented ladies to help pull it off.  There’s the hacker Nine Ball (Rihanna), the pickpocket Constance (Awkwafina), the jewel forger Amita (Mindy Kaling), the fence Tammy (Sarah Paulson), and the fashion designer Rose (Helena Bonham Carter).  THEN. NOTHING. HAPPENS.  Seriously, Debbie’s plan is so perfect that it all goes exactly as she dreamed up in prison.  There’s no tension, no sense of danger, no nothing.  It’s just a very boring heist where the only issue is so minor that the team is able to fix it while on the way to the job.  And that talented team?  Yeah, most of them don’t do much or even seem all that necessary.  This is very clearly Debbie’s movie, which is fine, but Bullock is so smarmy and charmless that it isn’t any fun at all watching her win.  There’s more that doesn’t work here as well.  George Clooney is not in the film, but Danny Ocean has a strange and completely useless subplot that lingers throughout it.  Also, Gary Ross is no Steven Soderbergh.  He does his best to mimic the style of the Ocean’s Trilogy, but it just comes off as cheap and derivative.

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting Ocean’s 8 to be this big of a misstep.  I figured it would at least be mildly entertaining, but it turned out to be a total bore.  Don’t bother.

One Last Thought:

If you were counting up above, then you may have noticed that I only mentioned seven members of the team.  The eighth is supposed to be a secret, I think, but she’s in the trailers and on all the posters, and in the end when she pops up it is quite possibly the least surprising “twist” in cinematic history.  I very loudly scoffed.