Soderbergh gets Lucky

There's top tier Soderbergh and like everyone else, there's middle tier. Some of his more challenging works tend to miss the mark (think Bubble or even, to some degree The Girlfriend Experience and Contagion, though the latter two are among my favorites), while some of the big crowd pleasers might be a bit thin, but I'd argue remain fun. Ocean's Eleven is a respected near-classic, but the sequels are less well-regarded. I like 'em all but I might point out here that like the Coen brothers, even the lightest of Soderbergh's work still has something worthwhile and is - as far as I can recall off the top of my head, never (or if not "never", rarely0 poorly executed. 

Lucky Logan is sometimes referred to as the Hillbilly Ocean's movie and while that's not entirely inaccurate, it misses some of the more salient points that make the movie a hoot and I'm not sure, but I'd say it's just a few beats away from a masterpiece (a word that I sometimes feel should be tossed out of the lexicon, at least for a while.)

Sure, the focus is on a caper/heist replete with twists, double-backs and double-crosses, and yes, it does have a pretty stacked cast (Channng Tatum, Adam Driver, and Daniel Craig headline, with some great turns by Hilary Swank, Farrah Mackenzie, Todd MacFarlane, and Jack Quaid and Brian Gleeson as Craig's brothers). There are certainly plenty of reasons to love the flick; it's a hoot written by Julie Asner under the pseudonym Rebecca Blunt since Soderbergh didn't want people to think his wife was getting special treatment; this was Soderbergh's first film after going into "retirement" - ha! -- and sure, it might seem as nepotism, but the truth is that it's a tight script).

I think I've dithered about this elsewhere and likely will again, but why wouldn't I consider this a better Soderbergh? A couple of things come to mind; first off, it may not have the "thematic richness" of his greatest work but second, the question is somewhat flawed from the get-go and I refer back to my parenthetical statement above; what if we just chucked words like "masterpiece" or "great" when we're looking at any work of art at the moment?

Even mediocre Soderbergh is going to stand head above shoulders over most product that comes out of any given studio. And of course, this is very much an entertainment and hey! - movies are (I know, right?) entertainment. Revisiting the flick years after seeing it in the theater was a genuine hoot and completely enjoyable.