“Ocean’s Twelve” is like watching a Hollywood party that was so successful it had to be thrown again.  George, Brad, Matt, Julia and Andy have all returned, as does the rest of the original cast, and are joined by party crashers Catherine Zeta-Jones, Bruce Willis, Albert Finney, and French star Vincent Cassel. 

The locale has changed — far away from Las Vegas to exotic spots in Rome, Paris, and Amsterdam — which makes it harder for director Steven Soderbergh to maintain a cohesive narrative.  Fortunately, that doesn’t make the party any less fun, and let’s face it: seeing our favorite stars have a blast within the confines of a silly, whimsical story can’t help but translate into ear-to-ear grins of our own.

Casino boss Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) said he would catch up with Ocean’s Eleven, and he has.  After giving them two weeks to come up with the roughly $200 million (he’s added interest) that was stolen from him, the Eleven reconvene and plan to steal the needed money.  For this they first go to Amsterdam, where they unexpectedly cross the path of a master thief known as the Night Fox (Cassel), who takes it personally that Ocean (George Clooney) and his gang are now considered the greatest thieves in the world. 

The gang must also contend with Europol agent Isabel Lahiri (Zeta-Jones), who specializes in catching thieves and is an ex-flame of Rusty Ryan (Brad Pitt).  Deception, plot twists, and elated fun ensue as everyone tries to outwit and outlast the others to come out on top.  Supporting players Elliot Gould, Carl Reiner, Bernie Mac, Don Cheadle, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Shaobo Qin and more do a sufficient job of keeping everyone smiling, even though their roles are not salient to the story. 

If anyone stood out in the first film, it was Pitt.  His assuredness, mannerisms, choice of words and constant eating made him the center of attention every time he was on screen.  This time the honors go to Damon, who without fail is good for a laugh in all of his scenes, particularly the “business” meeting between himself, Pitt, Clooney and Robbie Coltrane (Hagrid in the “Harry Potter” movies).  His youthfulness, and supposed naiveté, is pitch-perfect.

Too bad the constant change of scenery makes the story choppy.  In Las Vegas we knew that everything happening revolved around the heist of Benedict’s casino.  This film isn’t as tight; we have an idea of why most things are occurring, but the contrived ending and plot twists seem to come more out of nowhere than they should, i.e. in the first film they were understandable, and here they’re unpredictable to the point of absurdity.

But who cares?  That doesn’t make “Ocean’s Twelve” any less fun to watch.  This type of movie has been getting made for decades, and for decades these gitty vanity projects have been making us smile.  Consider this anecdote from Hollywood lore, which perfectly sums up “Twelve” as well: 

In 1963, after completing the long and dense “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” old friends John Wayne, Lee Marvin, and John Ford went to Hawaii to make “Donovan’s Reef.”  They hung out, drank, cavorted and clearly had a fabulous time both on vacation and making the movie.  It may be a flawed film, but the joy is in the zeitgeist of its creation — and boy is it a lot of fun to watch our iconic stars in action.

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