FILM 2004: OCEAN'S TWELVE

FILM 2004: OCEAN'S TWELVE 

TRIVIA: The Night Fox's mansion is on the shores of Lake Como in Italy. The name of the city overlooking Lake Como is Bellagio. The city and the lake were the inspiration for the design of the Bellagio casino in Las Vegas, site of the heist in Ocean's Eleven (2001).

While on production in Rome, Brad Pitt and George Clooney were not allowed back into the hotel because the doorman thought they were vagrants after the actors were caught in a rain storm while jogging.

George Clooney was 42 years-old at the time of filming the scene in which the other actors guess his age.

Six of the Ocean's Twelve have won Oscars: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, Matt Damon, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Casey Affleck.

The drysuits used by the gang were custom made for the production in two weeks by husband-and-wife team Gareth and Tina Roberts of Gryphon Watersports in Staffordshire, England. Only one of the ten suits ordered had to be fully functioning and waterproof, but the tight deadline still meant that the couple had to work round the clock to get the suits ready in time for the shoot in Amsterdam.

Five cast members also guest starred on Friends (1994-2004) including Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Bruce Willis and Elliot Gould

FILM 1854: OUT OF SIGHT

FILM 1854: OUT OF SIGHT

TRIVIA: Sandra Bullock almost got the part of Karen Sisco, but Director Steven Soderbergh was against it. He said: "I spent some time with Clooney and Bullock, and they actually did have a great chemistry. But it was for the wrong movie. I'm sure they could do a movie together. But not an Elmore Leonard movie." Clooney and Bullock appeared in Gravity(2013).

The mug shot of Jack Foley (George Clooney) (of which Karen (Jennifer Lopez) says "He doesn't even look like that.") is the mug shot of Clooney's character Seth Gecko from From Dusk Till Dawn (1996).

Michael Keaton reprised his role as Ray Nicolette in a small cameo. He originally played him in another Elmore Leonard novel-adapted film, Jackie Brown (1997).

This is one of George Clooney's favorite films on his resumé. He said "It was the first time where I had a say, and it was the first good screenplay I'd read where I just went 'That's it'. Even though it didn't do very well box-office wise, we sort of tanked again, it was a really good film."

Samuel L. Jackson and Michael Keaton did their cameos free of charge.

When Jack (George Clooney) sees the photo of Karen's (Jennifer Lopez's) father, he remarks that he has a "cop's face". In real-life, Dennis Farina (Marshall Sisco) was a former Chicago Police Officer. As an actor, the late Farina had several roles as a cop.

Lopez's Karen Sisco and Clooney's Jack Foley ranked #4 on Moviefone's "The Top 25 Sexiest Movie Couples" in May 2008.

The first of many George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh collaborations.

DIRECTOR TRADEMARK 

Steven Soderbergh: company named "Perennial"

FILM 1608: MONEY MONSTER

The screenplay for this film was featured in the 2014 Blacklist, a list of the "most liked" unmade scripts of the year.

When Patty is in the van with the computer tech, they try to figure out what "Mambo" might mean. While searching online, the tech suggests "Mambo Italiano", a song by George Clooney's aunt, Rosemary Clooney.

Film 1041: Gravity

Trivia: The film's space debris cascade is a very real possibility. This scenario is known as the Kessler syndrome, named after NASA scientist Donald J. Kessler who first proposed the theory in 1978. A cascading Kessler syndrome involving an object the size of the International Space Station would trigger a catastrophic debris chain-reaction. The orbiting debris field would make it impossible to launch space exploration missions or satellites for many decades.

Various mechanical sounds made by the spacecraft are heard on the soundtrack as a result of conduction through the astronauts' bodies while they are in contact with the station. For example, when Sandra Bullock's character is frantically trying to grab the handholds as she flies by the station, the sounds of the station are heard while she is holding a handle, and they cease when she lets go. On the actual moon missions the sounds of astronauts hitting their hammers on core sample tubes were conducted through their bodies and transmitted through their microphones.

Aningaaq, the man Dr. Stone talks to on the shortwave radio, is the main character of the short film Aningaaq (2013) directed by Jonás Cuarón. In that movie he is an Inuit fisherman with a dog sled and a baby daughter, camping on the ice over a frozen fjord.

Alfonso Cuarón, cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, and visual effects supervisor Tim Webber decided they couldn't make the film they wanted using traditional methods. For the spacewalk scenes, says Webber, "We decided to shoot (the actors') faces and create everything else digitally." To do that, Lubezki decided he needed to light the actors' faces to match the all-digital environment. Whether the characters were floating gently, changing direction or tumbling in space, the facial light would have to perfectly match the Earth, sun and stars in the background. "That can break easily," explains Lubezki, "if the light is not moving at the speed that it has to move, if the position of the light is not right, if the contrast or density on the faces is wrong." Lubezki suggested folding an LED screen into a box, putting the actor inside, and using the light from the screen to light the actor. That way, instead of moving either Bullock or Clooney in the middle of static lights, the projected image could move while they stayed still. The "light box", key to the spacewalk scenes was a nine-foot cube just big enough for one actor.

Angelina Jolie was originally cast, but dropped out later. Natalie Portman turned down the role shortly before she announced her pregnancy. Rachel Weisz, Naomi Watts, Marion Cotillard, Abbie Cornish, Carey Mulligan, Sienna Miller, Scarlett Johansson, Blake Lively, Rebecca Hall and Olivia Wilde were all subsequently tested or approached for the lead role.

The spacesuit that Dr. Stone puts on in the Russian Soyuz capsule has the number 42 on the patch. In the novel "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" 42 is "the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, The Universe, and Everything"

Although the film has received acclaim for its realism of its premises and its overall adherence to physical principles, director Alfonso Cuarón has admitted that the film is not always scientifically accurate and that some liberties were needed to sustain the story.

Film 890: Ocean’s Thirteen

Trivia: Al Pacino was director Steven Soderbergh's first choice for the role of Willie Bank. The film's producer, Jerry Weintraub, a friend of Pacino's, persuaded him to join the cast.

The fake nose Matt Damon wears is an in-joke reference to The Brothers Grimm, in which director Terry Gilliam wanted the actor to wear a fake nose but the studio vetoed it.

The film's translation in Russia is "13 Friends of Ocean".

Rusty's ring-tone is "Don't You Want Me" by The Human League.

Linus's fake nose ploy is "The Brody", a reference to actor Adrien Brody.

The Warner Bros. and Village Roadshow logos at the front of the film are styled in homage to the 1970s/1980s intro animation to New York station WOR-TV's "4 O'Clock Movie," and the accompanying music is identical.

The numbers that Mr. Weng picks to win at the roulette wheel are 11, 12 and 13 - the numbers of the three "Ocean" movies, thus far.