Ocean's Twelve (2004)

USA Today
"[I]t's enjoyable as a light and cheeky romp with the real-life camaraderie of Clooney, Pitt, Damon and the rest translating to the screen with charm and verve." 12/28/2004 p.4D

Chicago Sun-Times
"The movie takes inventory of its characters with the same droll wit it does everything else..." 12/10/2004 p.31

Sight and Sound
"[W]atching it is fun....Flashing sparkle at the audience like an expert conman, Soderbergh makes the hardest job of all -- following a hit film with a probably hit sequel -- look easy." 02/01/2005 p.63-4

Uncut
"Clooney and Pitt's genuine superstar chemistry here remains undimmed....It's still fun watching these characters saddle up for a second mission." 03/01/2005 p.130

James Berardinelli's ReelViews 7 of 10
Soderbergh peppers the print with occasional directorial flourishes (freeze-frames, the use of color - James Berardinelli
 
Rolling Stone 6 of 10
Soderbergh tries for the kind of insouciance that director Richard Lester brought to A Hard Day's - Peter Travers
 
Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
Just as most caper movies end with the thieves comfortably basking in retirement, so most sequels to caper movies begin with the thieves forced to go back to work and pull one more job. "Ocean's Twelve" does not disappoint...What Soderbergh is working with here is the charm of his actors, particularly Clooney, Roberts, Brad Pitt and Jones, who have the key roles, and the puppy-dog earnestness of Matt Damon, who wakes up Pitt on a trans-Atlantic flight to tell him he thinks he's ready to play "a more central role." Damon's character is named Linus, a good choice, since he is too sincere and intense to rise in Ocean's ironic universe...Example of the cleverness: There are two cameos in the movie that, for once, contribute something more than allowing us to say, "Hey! There's (name of star)!" The genius is that one of the stars is really there, and the other star is not really there, although she is there in the person of the character who seems to be her. This will all become clear when you see the movie. What I liked is that the one cameo role is used to expose the other cameo role. When you get to the point of interlocking cameos, you have ascended to a level of invention that is its own reward. - Roger Ebert
 
ReelViews 8 of 10
Pleasantness and affability reign supreme in Steven Soderbergh's sequel to the remake of Ocean's Eleven. This time around, even the bad guys don't seem so bad. Rumor has it that the atmosphere on the set of Ocean's Twelve was so easy-going that it was more like summer camp than a movie shoot, and much of the sense of fun comes across on screen. Everyone who survived the first film is back for the second, including the entire complement of "Ocean's Eleven." There are two high-profile newcomers. Catherine Zeta-Jones plays Europol agent Isabel Lahiri, an ex-flame of Rusty Ryan (Brad Pitt), who is the confidante of Danny Ocean (George Clooney)...Soderbergh peppers the print with occasional directorial flourishes (freeze-frames, the use of colored filters, etc.), but, for the most part, he presents the film "straight." And, on those occasions when he shows off, it's neither prolonged nor extreme enough to become distracting. One could make an argument that the filmmaker isn't so much directing his actors as he is shepherding them through the movie-making process. There's a sense that at least some of the dialogue was improvised. The final result speaks well for the process, whatever it actually was. - James Berardinelli