While the actors faces are intrinsic to our memories of those films, there is nothing in the films existence intrinsic to those precise faces and identities.
The existence of nothing hinges on Julia and Tess existing as dopplegangers except the plot of the film itself. And if Julia Real didn't act in Ocean's Eleven, her star needs not be diminished: she'd have taken some other project which could be a hit. Maybe even several in the time it took to film Ocean's Eleven in the real world.
The article's author's brain is wrapped up in la-la land and the cult of personality.
I think the main argument is a bit different. If two characters played by Julia Roberts and Matt Damon are talking and someone walks over and says "wow you must be Julia Roberts!", why do they not also say "and man you look like Matt Damon, insane coincidence ".
Why does only one of them look like their real life counterpart? I think also, this would ruin the plot of the previous Oceans's movie since why did no one recognize her in that one if she was the lookalike of a famous actress. It is clear that both movies live in the same universe since 12 is payback for 11.
The possibility that never seems to get brought up is "Maybe Matt Damon looks just a little different in this universe". Or, alternatively, that the movie itself is an unreliable narrator - Danny Ocean doesn't actually look like George Clooney, it's just the audience that sees home that way. Or maybe he does, but just a little off, while Julia Roberts and Tess are super spitting image.
The author does mention this possibility in one of the final paragraphs, that maybe every actor in the film /except/ Julia Roberts and Bruce Willis look different in the Ocean's 12 universe - it seems to be what the film wants the audience to think, and though it's a bit silly, so are the films :)
The author is someone I wouldn't like to have a discussion with at a party, because he insists if one character looks like the real actor in that movie, then every other character must have their actor doppelganger in that universe...
For related reasons I remember thinking the Oscars were absurd because you could never quite be sure if the person who won wasn't just an impostor.
That said, I'm also waiting for the final chapter that ties all of Keanu Reeves' films together into a single episodic narrative. I cannot recommend following me down this rabbit hole.
I caught the end of your comment without thinking and now I fear I've succumbed to the same mind virus. If it doesn't dissipate by tomorrow I think it is here to stay.
I can’t wait to see how Much Ado About Nothing is connected to Point Break. But, if I were going to script this, I could imagine the time machine from Bill and Teds fracturing space time into a Keanu multiverse… but that’s almost too obvious.
All he has to do is revisit them in the past and change the context and meaning of a few key lines and scenes, and given they occupy space in the minds of hundreds of millions of people, he may be able to repair our present timeline by altering the foundations of their ideas of meaning. Keanu is not our only hope, but he has one of the best shots we have.
I don't know if he's ready, and maybe someone from within the system could offer him a choice, but one from which there is no going back, and he cannot even hesitate or slow down once he has made it, but if he succeeds at being completely committed to the moment, he will self-actualize as an existential hero, become free, and in turn, free us all.
Julia Roberts' role in Oceans 13 may have unleashed something when she broke the fourth wall, like opening a box that cannot be closed, and the world will not be the same. If Keanu can find Bill Murray, I think he will have some answers. Of course, nobody actually finds Bill Murray, Bill Murray finds you.
Bill, if you are out there, the world needs you more than ever.
I don’t have anything to add. Just to complain that on top of being a bad heist with the lamest of twists, Oceans 8 explicitly featured an all female crew, but who discover that at the end of the movie a single man pulled an even bigger heist than all of them together with no direct help and without them noticing, substantially undermining their already strained gimmick
Brad Pitt not existing does not mean 12 Monkeys does not get made. It means that if it does get made, Brad Pitt does not appear in it. Due to not existing.
Sony is a brand, Caesar's Palace is a real place, as is Las Vegas, as the Coronation Egg a real object, etc, etc.
Just because there are parallels to real life, it does not mean that it exactly mirrors real life. It's like assuming that just because certain products/corporations are referenced in two different franchises that they somehow exist in the same universe. If that were the case then all television shows and movies also occur in reality by that logic.
They obviously don't. So obviously in these television/movie universes, sometimes things happen similarly. Although not exactly.
> Bruce Willis may exist in the Ocean’s universe, but the 1995 film Twelve Monkeys, which co-starred Brad Pitt, does not. Movies like Fight Club, Seven, Batman & Robin, The Perfect Storm, Saving Private Ryan, and The Untouchables can’t exist.
This is horrible logic. Just because the actors may not exist doesn't mean other actors weren't cast for the parts. There is no reason to believe the movies don't exist, just in a different form.
Ocean's 12 sucked as a movie, and this "plot twist" was just the rancid cherry on top of a steaming pile of nonsense. That's really all that should be taken away from it.
Ocean's 11 was cool and unique, and Ocean's 13 was a good sequel. 12 should be banished (just like Stargate: Origins).
Ocean's 12 is one of the greatest movies ever made.
It is a reality TV-esque take on the lives of master thieves. This begs the question, what does the life of a master thief look like? Is it that of the Night Fox? A wealthy, sophisticated French aristocrat, well-educated and very serious about his craft. Someone who has mastered the art of capoeira to evade security laser beams for example, and goes to such great lengths to be the best?
The second question is that of why? Why do you do what you do? What is the Night Fox's motivation for being a master thief? The relentless pursuit of perfection and pulling off the greatest heist ever? Just becoming the best for being the best sake?
I would like to present a real life example to you: the ongoing Messi versus Ronaldo debate.
Is the greatest football player an inimitable, natural-born artist or a perfection obsessed workaholic who probably owns a cryogenic chamber in which he sleeps every night to maintain peek physical fitness?
With these questions in mind, a second and third viewing of the Ocean's 12 movie will help you decide the debate of who is the greatest thief of them all.
If you were disappointed because you were looking for a heist movie with cool gadgets and mind-freak tricks, you can google "heist movie" and watch whatever pops up first (Now You See Me).
Yup fully aware it was a remake, but it was updated well for the time it was released. It also had a different style from the original, so "unique" is a fair term I reckon.
Crypto heists and scams make fictional crime look like amateur hour. A fake YouTube livestream can make hundreds of thousands of dollars in hours. A code bug can net tens or hundreds of millions. No need to rob a bank or casino.
Actors appear in docudramas all the time who do not resemble the real people they're playing. Jordan Belfort doesn't resemble Leonardo DiCaprio. So maybe, in the universe of the films, (most of) the characters don't actually resemble the actors who play them in our universe, but the parallel universe versions of those actors do resemble themselves.
This was played with a little bit in the 80s cartoon show, The Real Ghostbusters. The show was actually named that to distinguish it from the Filmation cartoon Ghostbusters (which was unrelated to, but made to capitalize on, the popularity of the 1984 film and take advantage of the rights to the name that Filmation still held) and reassure the audience that yes, unlike the Filmation cartoon, these are the Ghostbusters you're familiar with -- Peter, Ray, Winston and Egon, the Beatles of spook hunting.
But there is an in-universe explanation of the show's title, as well: in the universe of the show, the 1984 film Ghostbusters exists, and is based on the lives of the main characters of the show -- who, due to player-likeness issues in real life, look nothing like the film Ghostbusters. In an early episode, Venkman comments on his resemblance (or lack thereof) to his movie counterpart.
36 comments
[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 88.1 ms ] threadWhile the actors faces are intrinsic to our memories of those films, there is nothing in the films existence intrinsic to those precise faces and identities.
The existence of nothing hinges on Julia and Tess existing as dopplegangers except the plot of the film itself. And if Julia Real didn't act in Ocean's Eleven, her star needs not be diminished: she'd have taken some other project which could be a hit. Maybe even several in the time it took to film Ocean's Eleven in the real world.
The article's author's brain is wrapped up in la-la land and the cult of personality.
Why does only one of them look like their real life counterpart? I think also, this would ruin the plot of the previous Oceans's movie since why did no one recognize her in that one if she was the lookalike of a famous actress. It is clear that both movies live in the same universe since 12 is payback for 11.
That said, I'm also waiting for the final chapter that ties all of Keanu Reeves' films together into a single episodic narrative. I cannot recommend following me down this rabbit hole.
I don't know if he's ready, and maybe someone from within the system could offer him a choice, but one from which there is no going back, and he cannot even hesitate or slow down once he has made it, but if he succeeds at being completely committed to the moment, he will self-actualize as an existential hero, become free, and in turn, free us all.
Julia Roberts' role in Oceans 13 may have unleashed something when she broke the fourth wall, like opening a box that cannot be closed, and the world will not be the same. If Keanu can find Bill Murray, I think he will have some answers. Of course, nobody actually finds Bill Murray, Bill Murray finds you.
Bill, if you are out there, the world needs you more than ever.
Brad Pitt not existing does not mean 12 Monkeys does not get made. It means that if it does get made, Brad Pitt does not appear in it. Due to not existing.
Sony is a brand, Caesar's Palace is a real place, as is Las Vegas, as the Coronation Egg a real object, etc, etc.
Just because there are parallels to real life, it does not mean that it exactly mirrors real life. It's like assuming that just because certain products/corporations are referenced in two different franchises that they somehow exist in the same universe. If that were the case then all television shows and movies also occur in reality by that logic.
They obviously don't. So obviously in these television/movie universes, sometimes things happen similarly. Although not exactly.
This is horrible logic. Just because the actors may not exist doesn't mean other actors weren't cast for the parts. There is no reason to believe the movies don't exist, just in a different form.
I can’t really send it to any of my family and friends because none of them seems to read anymore.
Ocean's 11 was cool and unique, and Ocean's 13 was a good sequel. 12 should be banished (just like Stargate: Origins).
Ocean's 12 is one of the greatest movies ever made.
It is a reality TV-esque take on the lives of master thieves. This begs the question, what does the life of a master thief look like? Is it that of the Night Fox? A wealthy, sophisticated French aristocrat, well-educated and very serious about his craft. Someone who has mastered the art of capoeira to evade security laser beams for example, and goes to such great lengths to be the best?
The second question is that of why? Why do you do what you do? What is the Night Fox's motivation for being a master thief? The relentless pursuit of perfection and pulling off the greatest heist ever? Just becoming the best for being the best sake?
I would like to present a real life example to you: the ongoing Messi versus Ronaldo debate. Is the greatest football player an inimitable, natural-born artist or a perfection obsessed workaholic who probably owns a cryogenic chamber in which he sleeps every night to maintain peek physical fitness?
With these questions in mind, a second and third viewing of the Ocean's 12 movie will help you decide the debate of who is the greatest thief of them all.
If you were disappointed because you were looking for a heist movie with cool gadgets and mind-freak tricks, you can google "heist movie" and watch whatever pops up first (Now You See Me).
Ocean's 12 is for philosophical rumination.
It might have been cool, but it wasn't "unique." It was the second one.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean%27s_11
This was played with a little bit in the 80s cartoon show, The Real Ghostbusters. The show was actually named that to distinguish it from the Filmation cartoon Ghostbusters (which was unrelated to, but made to capitalize on, the popularity of the 1984 film and take advantage of the rights to the name that Filmation still held) and reassure the audience that yes, unlike the Filmation cartoon, these are the Ghostbusters you're familiar with -- Peter, Ray, Winston and Egon, the Beatles of spook hunting.
But there is an in-universe explanation of the show's title, as well: in the universe of the show, the 1984 film Ghostbusters exists, and is based on the lives of the main characters of the show -- who, due to player-likeness issues in real life, look nothing like the film Ghostbusters. In an early episode, Venkman comments on his resemblance (or lack thereof) to his movie counterpart.