BEFORE: I've started the process of figuring out if a "perfect year" is in fact possible. I figured out there were two main gaps to close, the one between "Spider-Man: Far From Home" and the start of October (about 72 days) and then the one between Halloween and the end of the year, which had to get me to "Star Wars: Episode IX" and then, ideally, a Christmas movie. This second gap, to close the year could be filled by anywhere from a minimum of 12 films up to a maximum of 55, depending on how big my solution to closing the first gap would be. Ideally I would take some time off in November and December to do holiday-related things, so I don't really want to pack the November schedule, I'd rather get the bulk of my films viewed in August and September, so I can relax more at the end of the year. But these gaps are huge, how do I even start thinking about closing them?
Let's start with what I know, that "Star Wars" is going to be released on December 20, which doesn't leave a lot of time to get to a Christmas movie. What's the quickest path there, based on the cast of the new "Star Wars" film? I know there are 9 key cast members who also appear in other films on my list, so that's a great place to start - two of them are dead ends, so that leaves 7 linking possibilities. I found I could get to TWO Christmas-y movies, which link to each other, in just three moves. Then I used the process I invented to deal with "Avengers: Endgame", where I coded all the films on my list that were one or two steps away from it. I did the same process for the film that I think will be last in my horror chain, and also for "Episode IX". That showed me three ways to get from "Bird Box" to the end of the year, and the one I like the most is 10 steps, which is not perfect, but it's close enough to the minimum estimate of 12 films. I can double-up on documentaries in July if I have to, to make this work.
Next I thought about the FIRST film in my horror chain, and ways to get there from "Spider-Man: Far From Home". A 72-film gap just has too many possibilities, but if I look at the big picture, and chip away at it from both ends, I can reduce the number of possibilities. Hey, maybe 6 films with Dwayne Johnson could fit on this end, this leads to another 5 films with Melissa McCarthy - and then these are the back-to-school films on my list, is there any way to get from them to a Melissa McCarthy film? And so on, until I can shorten the cap on either end and look for a way to seal things up. A couple hours of fiddling with it today, and now it's only a 50-film gap. Stay tuned, I'm getting there.
Katie Holmes carries over again from "Logan Lucky" to play Katie Holmes in tonight's film.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Ocean's Thirteen" (Movie #13)
THE PLOT: Debbie Ocean gathers an all-female crew to attempt an impossible heist at New York City's annual Met gala.
AFTER: More good timing, on my part, since the annual Met Gala also takes place in May, just like the Coca-Cola 600. Umm, only it takes place in early May, not late may. Details, details. There's also the Steven Soderbergh connection, he directed "Logan Lucky" and the "Ocean's" movies (11 through 13), but he's only a producer on this one, not a director. Again, details.
But this is still a (mostly) fun comic heist where a team of people with different skill sets has to work around security at a majorly-attended event. And the lead character has a definite set of moral values to determine what is right and what is wrong, even if stealing somehow fits into the "right" column. Jimmy Logan was trying to overturn a perceived family curse and had a certain limit on how much money should be stolen from the racetrack, while Debbie Ocean, even though she's got a much higher number in mind, also is seeking vengeance against the ex-boyfriend who framed her and testified against her, as a bonus element to the whole heist.
We're led to believe that her time in prison was spent planning this heist, down to the smallest detail. Five years, eight months and twelve days, or something like that. But there's just no way she could have foreseen every little detail from her jail cell, right? Well, she had internet access, I guess she could research the details of the Met gala, figure out what piece of jewelry she wanted to go after, etc. It's still a bit of a stretch, because as we learned yesterday, there's always something that's going to go wrong during a heist, but it's a matter of putting the right team together so that no matter what goes wrong at the last minute, someone will be able to handle it.
That team just happens to be all-female, which should be acceptable now, plus it's oh-so-trendy - anything men can do, women can do, also, but should that include stealing and breaking the law? Now I'm not sure if that's a step forward for women's rights or a step back. Discuss. If women fighting for equal pay and equal rights, does that include an equal right to commit crimes and get away with it? Maybe they should aim higher, that's all I'm saying. Why not assemble a team of expert women to form a successful company, or work toward curing a disease, or raising money for a charity? All of those would be more noble than stealing jewelry, even if they wouldn't make for an exciting movie.
There's been all kinds of exciting new tech that's been invented since "Ocean's Thirteen", like 3-D printing, which is great. But then, the film also falls back on older tech, like using "hacking" in a ubiquitous fashion, to cover any little solution to the problems they'll face in the planning stages, or in the heist itself. So that seems like a bit of a wash. It's also a little convenient that they managed to get someone on to the staff of Vogue magazine with very little effort, in a tight time-frame. What if that magazine had hired more people a month earlier, to handle the extra pressures of the annual gala?
One could also argue, that, as in "Logan Lucky", the agent investigating the crime afterwards manages to focus on the responsible party quite quickly, despite evidence of a solid alibi. It seems like any standard investigation would take much more time, in both cases. But again, I understand this is a movie, and they have to hurry things along.
But if I've got a NITPICK POINT, it's that this film didn't go nearly crazy enough with its portrayal of the Met gala, they treated it like just another event where people are expected to dress fancy, wear jewels and such. My understanding is that the fashion seen there is much more elaborate, and there's usually a wild theme, like this year it was "camp", as in the exaggeration of the unnatural, but I'll bet there were a few people who arrived in very fashionable hiking gear, either because they misunderstood or took advantage of the double meaning of the word. In 2018, the theme was "Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination", with celebrities dressing up like nuns and popes and such. There's no hint in "Ocean's 8" about exactly how outrageous the fashion at this event really can be.
Also starring Sandra Bullock (last seen in "Our Brand Is Crisis"), Cate Blanchett (last seen in "The Gift"), Anne Hathaway (last seen in "Alice Through the Looking Glass"), Helena Bonham Carter (ditto), Richard Armitage (ditto), Mindy Kaling (last seen in "A Wrinkle in Time"), Sarah Paulson (last seen in "Rebel in the Rye"), Awkwafina (last seen in "Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising"), Rihanna (last seen in "Clive Davis: The Soundtrack of Our Lives"), James Corden (last heard in "Trolls"), James Hindman, Eaddy Kiernan, Nathanya Alexander, Waris Ahluwalia, with cameos from Dakota Fanning (last seen in "The Cat in the Hat"), Elliott Gould (last seen in "Kicking and Screaming"), Qin Shaobo (last seen in "Ocean's Thirteen"), Marlo Thomas, Dana Ivey (last seen in "Orange County"), Mary Louise Wilson, Elizabeth Ashley, Anna Wintour, Zayn Malik, Maria Sharapova, Serena Williams, Kim Kardashian West, Kendall Jenner, Kylie Jenner, Common (last seen in "Movie 43"), Ira Glass, Tommy Hilfiger, Alexander Wang, Gigi Hadid, Lily Aldridge, Olivia Munn (last seen in "Office Christmas Party"), Jamie King, Adriana Lima, Zac Posen, Hailey Baldwin, Heidi Klum, Sofia Richie, and the voices of Griffin Dunne (last seen in "War Machine"), John McEnroe (last seen in "Wimbledon").
RATING: 6 out of 10 parole violations
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