Ocean’s 13

June 8 2007: The Final Year of Cinema Week 23

There’s a lot of talk in The Discourse™ of 2025 about the crisis of young masculinity. Young men —we are told— are being scolded by the left for their mere existence and being sold a bill of goods by the right. While I take issue with the notion of leftist scolding, I can absolutely see where many right-wing-grifters are taking advantage of young mens’ insecurity to both peddle simplistic plausible lies and line their pockets in the process. These are men like Jordan B Peterson, who insist that keeping a tidy home and denying trans people the dignity of their own existence are both integral for fighting chaos and entropy from destroying civilization. Or they’re men like Andrew Tate who insist that treating anyone but a straight man with any kind of respect makes one a beta cuck. These men are evil, and in a righteous society would be shunned for their beliefs and live as pariahs, but alas, that is not the society we live in.

While I hate these grifters with my life, I understand why young men are drawn to them, because these grifters are selling an easy notion of explicitly masculine greatness, and no one likes gender-affirming messages more than cisgender men. I would know, I, too, am a cisgender man, and while I’ve matured as a person enough to see through most of these grifts, I 100% bought into some dumb dude marketing when I was a young man. I have said the phrase “epic bacon”. I have purchased a nonzero number of Axe brand hygiene products. I’ve listened to Danzig records on purpose. While many of my fellow left-leaning comrades insist on the creation of a new leftist messaging that speaks to these disaffected young men, I would counter that the world is already providing exactly such a message in the form of the nascent “Dudes Rock” phenomenon.

I will not be able to summarize the way Dudes Rock any better than Mel Magazine’s Miles Klee in his essay on the subject, so I will simply quote his introduction to the concept in full

As a fledgling in-joke, “dudes rock” was a convenient way to satirize unprovoked, red-pill-type machismo — observing Mother’s Day by noting the supremacy of dudes, for example. But it also quickly became a shorthand for owning up to activities that, while not explicitly bad, feel intrinsically or even embarrassingly dude-like, from gaming for hours on end to growing a neckbeard to cracking open a cold one with the boys. While inundated with stories about awful, predatory men, you could still look at your unsheeted mattress and say to yourself: dudes rock.

A quick search of “dudes rock” on my social media platform of choice at time of writing resulted in the following examples of dudes rocking: Belt sander races. Hundreds of muscle dudes congratulating a trans woman on beginning her gender journey. Building a laser that can melt diamonds. Converting an 80s Toyota pickup truck into an e-vehicle for $6,000. These are all excellent examples of dudes rocking, but do you know what else is a way that dudes can rock? Getting together with a group of their besties to ruin a billionaire’s day, that’s now.

Ocean’s 13 is a movie about thirteen dudes who rock (George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, Bernie Mac, Eddie Izzard¹, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Carl Reiner, Eddie Jemison, Qin Shaobo, Elliot Gould, and Andy Garcia) who decide to fuck with a billionare who sucks (Al Pacino) with the power of wits and friendship.

Every one of Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s movies² are about the same thing. A heist is begging to be pulled, there’s money on the table, and a crack group of highly talented criminals band together to pull off the seemingly impossible and perform this heist. They do this because of potential material gain, because the mark has it coming, and because it’s a challenge, and these dudes love a challenge. The broad strokes are always the same. I’m not going to go into the particulars of the heist or the machinations of how it’s pulled off. Much like describing a physical comedy routine or a dance, to describe these twists and turns both robs them of their effectiveness when they are beheld, and in no way is the written word up to the task of accurately describing what is beheld. I will merely say that the heists are intricate, the cons elaborate, and boy howdy are they a joy to observe.

What I will describe though is how much these dudes rock. Every one of Danny Ocean’s gang of gentlemen bandits are super masculine, but rarely in a toxic way. The film opens with Brad Pitt’s character Rusty in the middle of a different heist when a call comes in from his buddy Danny requesting his presence. Rusty doesn’t even finish the heist he’s in the midst of; he simply bounces as the opening credits begin to roll. We later find out this is because Elliott Gould’s character Reuben has had a stroke due to stress from a business deal that went wrong, and Danny is assembling his team to get back at the man who did this to Reuben. Rusty is forgoing material gain because his friends need him, and that rules. Friendship rocks. Everything these men do in this film is done with a backbone of a deep abiding love and respect for one another. May we all be blessed with friendships as deep as Danny Ocean and his crew.

A good deal of the details of the heist revolve around a small window of time during which the crew will have ample time to cheat at casino games and keep the winnings. In order to smuggle several sets of specially loaded dice into the casino that they can manipulate, they do not compromise the casino’s dice storage, they do not compromise the casino’s dice procurement procedures, they compromise the factory in Mexico where the dice are manufactured. Casey Affleck’s character Virgil infiltrates the factory with the aim of manufacturing the loaded dice that will be casino-bound. When the mission is potentially compromised due to a strike at the dice factory, does Virgil get around this by breaking the strike and getting back into the factory? No! He rallies the workers for their rights, reminding them of the fight fought by Emiliano Zapata and his legacy that they must uphold³. Also he’s wearing a ridiculous mustache while doing it, and all of this rocks. Workers rights and mustaches rock.

It’s cliché to talk about when discussing a film where 13 of the primary characters are confidence men, but it’s delightful to watch how confident these men are. The situations and nature of the plot are ridiculous, but each of them approach these ridiculous situations with a serene and quiet dignity, as though there is never a doubt in their mind that their absurd plot will work. As part of the plot Carl Reiner’s character Saul needs to pretend to be an old-money English aristocrat. Carl Reiner is a Jewish-American comedian who did the bulk of his work in the 50s and 60s. While putting on his act, he mostly comes across as a mid century Jewish-American comedic version of an old-money English aristocrat. Like a guest-star character on an episode of The Monkees played by George Burns or something. In addition, Don Cheadle’s character Basher at one point must distract the villain Bank (Al Pacino) by pretending to be an Evel Knievel-style motorcycle stunt performer while wearing an absurd Chuck Berry conk wig. Both of these characters are profoundly silly, and correctly played for laughs. What should happen while watching them is seeing the charade fall apart as these transparently false characters weave their way into the heist, but that is not what happens. Both of these men sell these ridiculous characters so well with the supreme power of their own self-confidence that I did not simply enjoy their performances, I also bought that the other characters bought their lies. Self confidence rocks.

While it’s not an integral plot point or anything, a marvelous aspect of this film is how goddamn good everyone looks. A big part of that is starting out with George Clooney and Brad Pitt’s genetics, to be fair, but at the same time the hair, makeup, and clothes are done exquisitely. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a cast as well dressed as any Ocean’s cast. Keep in mind, this extends beyond Brad Pitt wearing an understated mustard sportscoat with a classic yellow oxford and a brown Prada belt. It also goes to Elliot Gould’s bathrobes and Carl Reiner’s bucket hats. Everyone is dressed perfectly, not just down to what makes them look good, but down to what makes each character themselves. Danny Ocean would not look good in an orange creamsicle colored suit, but Bernie Mac looks like a million dollars in one. What I especially loved is how the villain —Al Pacino’s Willy Bank— is dressed in clothes that are clearly of high quality materials and tailored well to his body but that also look like tacky garbage. The silks of his tie and pocket square are just a little too bright. The stripes on his shirt clash just a little too much with his suit. His eyeglasses are just a little too Randy Jackson. He ties his ties with a gaudy full windsor knot. His character knows just enough about clothes to know how to project wealth and power, but not enough to look good. His clothes suck, but everyone else’s rocks.

Some of the best cinema in the world not only serves as entertainment, but serves as a model for how to exist in the world without being preachy about it. I do not recommend pulling large scale heists on casinos. It seems like a lot of work and unlikely to succeed. You know what I do recommend though? Forming close knit friendships through the power of group projects, being confident in yourself, and wearing spectacular suits while doing so. We do not need a “Joe Rogan of the left”. We need young men to watch the Ocean’s trilogy.

Rating: ★★★★☆ I didn’t even get to talk about the horny Ellen Barkin / prosthetic nose angle. If you like a heist, you owe it to yourself to revisit the Ocean’s films.

Economics: Ocean’s 13 opened to #1 at the box office 18 years ago today on June 8, 2007, dethroning Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, knocking it into #2 in its third week of release. It would go on to make $117 domestic and $311 worldwide at the box office plus $49 million in DVD sales against a $85 million budget, making it a hit but not a runaway hit. It is the final film Soderbergh made in the Ocean’s series until he produced Ocean’s 8 in 2018. Bless him for going out on top. While he would not direct another Ocean’s movie, he would revisit the theme of dudes rocking in 2012 with the Channing Tatum exotic dance film Magic Mike

Other 2007 films released 18 years ago this week

La Vie En Rose: Marion Cotillard is making a lot of choices in this Edith Piaf biopic. I’m not saying they’re good choices, but they certainly are choices. Piaf lived a fascinating life that lends itself to a cinematic depiction, and of course there’s ample opportunity for musical numbers so it would be difficult for a competent filmmaker to make a bad movie out of her life. Olivier Dahan is a competent filmmaker, so he has not made a bad movie. It is unfortunately not an excellent movie. As a moderate francophile and person interested in the earliest forms of recorded music I had fun, but I also can see this being drudgery to the kind of person who prefers their films to have at least one point blank headshot. ★★★☆☆

1. While she has long experimented with gender presentation throughout her career, since the release of this film Izzard has come out as a trans woman and I will be gendering her appropriately. Everything about her stand-up and writings since I began following her in the late 90s would tell me though that she would a) agree that Oceans 13 is a film about dudes who rock, and b) that while she is a woman, in this film she is playing a dude (who rocks)

2. as well as its spinoff Ocean’s 8 (2018)

3. I would argue that given that the factory is in the norteño city of Juarez that Virgil should be conjuring the image of a different revolutionary hero: the leader of the Division Del Norte, Pancho Villa, but screenwriters Brian Koppelman and David Levien can pay their mortgages by writing movies while I’m just a nerd who reads books about Álvaro Obregón for fun so ultimately I suppose they’re right