Ocean’s 8 (2018)
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Ocean’s 8 Movie Review
Ocean’s 8 is a 2018 heist film directed by Gary Ross and starring the ensemble cast consisting of Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett and Anne Hathaway. It’s a very serviceable, solid, fun flick.
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“You would’ve loved him“
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It follows Danny Ocean’s sister Debbie who is released from prison and organizes a major diamond necklace heist at the gala with six other women. The story is serviceable and slight which is usual for this genre. It’s not bad, but it isn’t great either. I liked the ending and I absolutely loved the beginning which was very smart and instantly hooked me in. It’s a shame that the rest of the film never was as exciting or as entertaining as those first couple of scenes.
It needed more humor in it as it’s sorely lacking in the comedy department. A couple of lines and situations are amusing, but most of the film plays too straight. The heist itself is fun and actually more entertaining than the majority of other entries in this franchise, but it still isn’t as exciting as it should have been and the second heist twist isn’t as good.
The movie surely does have an amazing cast and everyone did an excellent job, but some got more and some got significantly less to do unfortunately. Let’s first mention the standouts. Sandra Bullock is fantastic. She looks great and acts literally like her brother character played by George Clooney which made her a great casting choice for this role. She’s constantly amusing and very suave.
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Cate Blanchett isn’t as memorable unfortunately, but their dynamic and potentially homoerotic relationship is a lot of fun. Anne Hathaway is actually the best part of the entire movie which was unexpected but still a welcome development. She plays a rich spoiled female stereotype and it works as that’s how the public conceived this actress so that choice was very clever and it paid off significantly in the comedy department. She’s very funny and consistently charismatic.
Mindy Kaling is unfortunately sorely underused as is Sarah Poulson. They’re both fine, but not great. Awkwafina also did not get much to do, but she’s a breath of fresh air as she’s different, cool and more energetic and a type of regular street girl which the other women aren’t. Rihanna is cool as this capable hacker, but again underutilized as well. Helena Bonham Carter is fun, but typecast. And James Corden is quite amusing in the last act of the film.
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Ocean’s 8 features a couple of fun action sequences, but mostly the heist itself revolved around the smarts on the women and it surprised me that they weren’t more physically proactive. The pacing is problematic as the second act of the movie can get a bit slow and uninteresting compared to the rest of the movie. The direction from Gary Ross also isn’t great and the dialogue is fine, but it should have been better. But in spite of its flaws, this is an underrated entry in this franchise which is actually the best movie after ‘Ocean’s Eleven’.
Ocean’s 8 has its less interesting parts in the second act, some characters are very underused and team-wise the characters do not work as well as they do individually, but it’s still quite an entertaining film with a solid heist and an excellent beginning. The standouts in the cast include Sandra Bullock who’s very suave and Anne Hathaway who stole the show both in terms of the acting and in terms of the humor.
