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Date: ________________________________
Film Analysis
Ocean’s 11 Handout #2
Period 3 & 7
Ocean’s 11
Ensemble, Professional Plot Movie Guidelines
(Repeat, These are Guidelines, Not Rules)
Ensemble Movie – What It Is:
The action of a movie follows the hero’s journey and is controlled by what he/she wants.
Notice that, out of the 24 movie titles displayed on the back wall, 8 contain character
names or references (for example, The Fugitive refers to leading character Richard
Kimble), and 7 contain the actual name of the leading character.
In an ensemble movie, several people want the same thing, join forces to achieve their
common goal, and, for the most part continue working together despite minor conflicts.
In Ocean’s 11, Danny’s crew all want to rob the 3 casinos. However, Danny is the first
among equals here, just as Tom Hanks’ Captain Miller is first among equals in the quest
to save Private Ryan. In many buddy movies, there is also a first among equals, like
Seth in Superbad (it’s Seth’s task to bring the booze to Jule’s party that sets the quest in
motion), or Woody in Toy Story (it’s Woody’s desire to be with Andy that propels the
story).
Professional Plot Conventions:



Introductions.
o Usually characters are introduced according to their “profession” or
specialty:
 Bashar blows a safe;
 Turk and Virgil drive and are good with gadgets;
 Linus picks a pocket;
 Etc.
Characters have a recognizable trait.
o They often have a recurring“tag,” that’s a part of them and their identity:
 Reuben’s cigar;
 Saul’s ulcer pills;
 Livingston sweats.
Characters are further tagged by their way of dress.
o Note: the cool guys are always cool, no matter how they’re dressed, and the
uncool guys are never cool no matter what. Also, Danny and Rusty are
cool in their own ways, while Saul and Livingston are decidedly uncool in
their own ways:
 Danny’s tuxedos and dark suits;
 Rusty’s fitted shirts and shiny suits;
 Saul’s safari jacket and sun hat;
 Linus’s T-shirts and lightweight jackets.

Skills.
o Closely related to Intros, everyone has his/her special role in the plan and
heist:
 Danny’s the idea guy who also knows people;
 Rusty’s the right hand man who gets things done;
 Everyone is capable of several levels of con (disguise, quick-change,
accents, knowledge of technology and tools, building a facsimile of a
vault for crying out loud);
 Tess is the femme, the wild card who complicates things, which is
what femmes do.

Everyone has a showcase moment.
o This may occur anywhere in the movie and may or may not move the plot
forward (but it’s better when it does, as in the following examples):
 Frank’s scene literally strong-arming the car salesman;
 Basher’s indecipherable rant about the blackout;
 Livingston’s characteristically sweaty encounter with security
guard.
Tomorrow, in Handout #3, we’ll talk about Heist Movie Conventions.