Steven Soderbergh Ranked

Welcome to the latest edition of "Ranked"-where I rank a franchise or filmography from worst to best and hand out related accolades. This week, I'm profiling the work of Steven Soderbergh-whose latest project "Let Them All Talk" debuts on HBO Max this Thursday.

 Steven Soderbergh's Filmography Ranked:

16.Ocean's Twelve (D-)

15.Haywire (D)

14.Unsane (D+)

13.Sex, Lies, and Videotape (D+)

12.High Flying Bird (C)

11.The Informant! (C+)

10.The Limey (B-)

9.Side Effects (B)

8.Traffic (B)

7.Magic Mike (B)

6.Contagion (B)

5.Logan Lucky (B)

4.Erin Brockovich (B) 

3.Ocean's Thirteen (B+)

2.Out of Sight (B+)

1.Ocean's Eleven (A)

Top Dog: Ocean's Eleven (2001)

If there was a playbook written on how construct the perfect heist movie, Ocean's Eleven would be at the forefront of it. The entire cast is comprised of funny, charismatic performers that are on the same wavelength, the pacing is electric and most importantly, the central robbery sequence is the perfect combination of creative, suspenseful and just plain fun.

Lowlight: Ocean's Twelve (2004)

The miserable failure of Ocean's Twelve remains a hard mystery to crack 16 years after its release. Was George Nolfi concussed when he wrote the script? Did the actor's develop a beef with each other that killed the endless chemistry they had on the first film? Did Soderbergh suddenly forget how to handle the rhythm of a heist movie? Even if any (or all) of those statements were actually true, it wouldn't properly explain how the same people behind a damn near perfect heist movie managed to follow it up with a boring, convoluted and infuriating mess that actively went against everything that made its predecessor great.

Most Underrated: Out of Sight (1998)

Propelled by a clever, witty script from Scott Frank (aka the guy behind the current Netflix phenomenon The Queen's Gambit) and solid performances from a stacked ensemble cast (George Clooney, Jennifer Lopez, Ving Rhames, Don Cheadle, Steve Zahn, Albert Brooks, Dennis Farnia, Catherine Keener), Out of Sight solidifies itself as one of the most enthralling, clever and collectively well-constructed crime movies of the 90's.  

Most Overrated: Sex, Lies and Videotape (1989)

Soderbergh's initial breakout effort is the perfect distillation of everything that sinks his bad movies. Sex, Lies and Videotape features unlikable characters, non-stop monologues and very few consequential events packaged into a sluggish movie that legitimately feels like it's never going to end. 

Saddest Excuse for An Action Movie: Haywire (2012)

Particularly in the past decade, Soderbergh has made his bones with a guerilla style of filmmaking that  rely upon handheld camerawork and a rough story outline with no written dialogue. Unsurprisingly, his "point and shoot" approach doesn't always generate the best results and the biggest backfiring of this erratic technique to date came with this dull, unbelievably inept espionage actioner. Not having a real story structure and using cheap cameras not only fails to give Haywire the tense, visceral feel it seems to be going for, it makes it look/operate like a direct to video production that was put together by some hacks whose only skill is being able to get legit actors (Michael Fassbender, Michael Douglas, Ewan McGregor, Antonio Banderas, Channing Tatum) to star in their unwatchable microbudget trash.   

Best Character Study About a Male Stripper: Magic Mike (2012)

Millions of people rushed to theaters in June 2012 expecting to catch an extended look at the hogs of Channing Tatum, Matthew McConaughey and Joe Manganiello left disappointed when they discovered that Magic Mike was a lowkey drama about a day laborer (Tatum) who moonlights as a stripper to work towards his dream of starting a custom furniture business instead of a two hour dong parade. While I certainly understand the frustration of the people that were treated to more monologues about the physical and mental tolls of stripping than full frontal male nudity, I enjoyed the product that actually made it to the screen quite a bit. The easygoing atmosphere Soderbergh establishes matches its Central Florida setting perfectly and Tatum does a great job of making the titular character a charismatic guy who has much more depth than anybody in his orbit gives him credit for.