Writer: Cammy Zulkifli

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Watch this if you liked: "Reservoir Dogs", "The Thomas Crown Affair"

Danny Ocean's (George Clooney) band of ethical bandits congregate once more after one of their original members, Reuben Tishkoff (Elliott Gould), was double-crossed by risque hotelier and casino owner, Willy Bank (Al Pacino).

After a cunningly successful heist in Ocean's 12 where the gang went head-to-head against fellow 'sticky fingers' Francois Toulour (Vincent Cassel), it seems their bond of thieving brotherhood was too strong to just let Bank off easy. Very quickly, a plan to infiltrate Bank's newly operational hotel and casino, aptly called The Bank, is constructed and put into motion.

The movie stays true to a scheme that's coherently similar to its previous two counterparts. It begins a quarter-way down its timeline, flashes back to an incident four weeks prior and speeds up to the present. This technique is perhaps a deliberate move for everything here is about misdirection. Writers Brian Koppelman and David Levien are smart enough not to disclose who's fooling who until the very end and director Steven Soderbergh is the genius who orchestrates it onto screen.

All three Ocean's movies have a certain retro approach that's mildly nostalgic. Even I am not sure why it keeps reminding me of Charlie's Angels. Some scenes disorientate the eye when it breaks into fractions unveiling different angles of the same compound but isn't that the whole point already?

Despite its mischievous tactics to fool the spectator, Ocean's 13 is not entirely incomprehensible. There's always that light humour Rusty Ryan (Brad Pitt) always comes up with and the other members of the gang are equally amusing. The cast just keeps getting better and bigger in size every time.

Their objective is still the same (embezzling) but the driving force behind their heist this time seems to emanate out of sheer revenge. While Tishkoff is bed-ridden after a heart attack caused by Bank, the rest of the team plans to unease Bank by jeopardising his reputation as a ruthless businessman. Their main target -The Bank.

Bank's new hotel and casino are his most prized possessions. But as the saying goes, 'the house always wins'. Ocean and his gang devise a fool-proof strategy to disprove that very notion and ultimately, leave Bank a beautifully broken man.

This is where the movie never fails to impress me. The intricate execution of their mission is nothing short of brilliant and the writers managed to pull off a legitimate show. Memorable characters from the previous two movies like Roman Nagel (Eddie Izzard) and Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) are brought back for old times' sake and it sizzles the plot further. Francois Toulour's return was indeed surprising as he appears arbitrarily throughout the movie but no one knows his purpose until it was appropriately revealed.

Although the movie is filmed almost entirely in Las Vegas, as opposed to Ocean's 11 or Ocean's 12 where locations were aplenty, it still sticks to what it does best. However, they could've used another gorgeous leading lady to fill the cavity left by Tess (Julia Roberts) and Isabel (Catherine-Zeta Jones) who are dismissed from this movie because as Danny Ocean says, "It's not their fight."

Cinema Online, 23 September 2008