Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s 12 was not well-received by fans and it sadly did not live up to the outstanding performance of its 2001 predecessor. Still, it was fun to watch, especially if you won’t take that one controversial scene too seriously involving Julia Roberts.
The director was aware of the backlash his sequel received, but he’s not letting it affect his confidence especially since he believed the movie was spectacular to look at and it generously featured a line-up of A-listers.
Steven Soderbergh Has No Regrets Over Julia Roberts Scene in Ocean’s 12
With the news of an Ocean’s reboot and a planned sequel, many would be revisiting the old movies, and when filmmaker Steven Soderbergh was asked by HuffPost Entertainment if there’s a way he would be able to pull off another Ocean’s 12, he responded with, “No f—king way.”
Helming a sequel for a successful original movie is always difficult, but the director knew that attempting to make another Ocean’s 12 in today’s media landscape would yield negative feedback. He highlighted Julia Roberts’ scene in the movie as a “big point of contention”.
For a refresher, Roberts played Tess Ocean, the wife of George Clooney’s Danny Ocean. In one of the scenes, Matt Damon’s character asked her to impersonate the actress Julia Roberts as part of the con.
As expected, the joke elicited mixed responses from the viewers. Even former Warner Bros. president Alan Horn had doubts about the scene, but Soderbergh was confident they would be able to pull it off. “It’s going to work. People will be able to follow it. Their heads will not split in half,” he recalled telling the boss.
The director also believed the cast, even Roberts, was “happy to be in on the joke”. All of them were coming up with ways to deliver it in the best way possible. At the end of the day, the issue with it is not that deep. In fact, people still went to see Ocean’s 13, which performed better critically than the sequel.
Roberts, however, did not reprise her role, due to not wanting to get involved in the film unless her character received a significant part in the story.
Will Steven Soderbergh Direct Ocean’s Reboot?
Soderbergh won’t be returning to helm the upcoming Ocean’s installments. He said in his interview with Variety that he was pretty much done with the heist thriller franchise. “After we made the third movie, I felt like the series was very much concluded for me,” the director explained.
The studio offered the project to him, but he declined as he felt it wouldn’t move his career forward. Apparently, he is chasing a new project which he did not reveal at the time.
The upcoming prequel will star Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, with the Barbie actress serving as a producer. Meanwhile, Ocean’s 14 is reportedly in development.
Ocean’s films are currently available to watch on Max.
