OUT OF SIGHT

Steven Soderbergh directed this crime caper adapted from the novel by Elmore Leonard. When ex-con Jack Foley (George Clooney) robs a.
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In playing a career criminal who can't get a break, Clooney has finally found a movie role that adroitly showcases his smoldering good looks and smart-aleck demeanor. The movie is wonderfully cast -- it has the strongest bench of any movie this year, with Albert Brooks and Don Cheadle in key supporting roles.

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Much of the action seems more like warmed-over Quentin Tarantino than first-rate Steven Soderbergh. There are many aspects making this a highlight of the genre. Steven Soderbergh's flawless directing, the editing and the wonderfully complex storytelling on two time levels, that surely requires some concentration to follow. His interesting choice of colors, differing between the warm tones of the hot Florida sun and then the switch into cold, blue and white Detroit, where red only reappears in the shape of blood.

The smart, witty, sometimes funny, sometimes brutally violent script that includes dialogs you wanna learn by heart.

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An awesomely grooving and cool Soundtrack by David Holmes. And a cast to dream of down to the smallest roles, most of the actors giving the performance of their lifetime: Lo is hardly recognizable as the irrelevant pop singer of recent years, doing a great job as a female cop tempted by the attracting opposites of bank robber George Clooney, who was never better than here.

Their chemistry is a big part of what makes this movie work, especially the hotel bar scene and its continuation contains more sparks than some movie years combined. Jackson's wonderful cameo in the last minute of the film: Michael Keaton simply walking into this film as the same character he already portrayed in Tarantino's Jackie Brown also based on a Elmore Leonard book as if that was the most natural thing ever is another highlight.

No, I can't decide what to bring up first, but it all combines into a crime thriller romance that is pretty much perfection and one of masterpieces of the 90s.

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Elmore Leonard had been writing crime and western novels as far back as the 's and has had numerous adaptations of his work: Majestyk are just some of the more familiar ones. However, around the mid 90's there was somewhat of a reinvestment in his work. After the release of Quentin Tarantino's hugely influential Pulp Fiction in , crime became cool again and Elmore Leonard became the go-to guy for the material.

Steven Soderbergh then rounded them off with this stylish film that, arguably, handed George Clooney the first role that suited him as a fully fledged leading man. Jack Foley George Clooney is a career bank robber that's done his fair share of jail time. After a recent breakout, he heads for Detroit to pull off his final job by relieving tycoon Richard Ripley Albert Brooks of his uncut diamond stash.

Out of sight

However, Foley has to contend with other ex-cons with the same idea while evading the law and his infatuation with US Marshall Karen Sisco Jennifer Lopez. Opening with the most remarkably cool and composed bank robbery you're ever likely to see, it's clear from the offset that Soderbergh and Clooney are on very fine form. The mood is also helped by an excellent score by David Holmes that taps into a 70's caper vibe while Soderbergh employs a whole host of stylistic, directorial flourishes; he cleverly plays with the time frame throughout the narrative with complex use of flashbacks and freeze frames and puts a fresh spin on film noir.

Anyone familiar with Leonard's novels will be fully aware of his colourful characters and sharp, snappy dialogue. In bringing them to the screen, Soderbergh assembles a rich gallery of performers; despite Leonard envisioning Jack Nicholson or Sean Connery as Jack Foley when he sold the film rights of his novel, it's a role that fits Clooney like a glove. He brings the requisite charm and charisma and it remains one of his most perfectly suited roles to this day.

He's accompanied by a stellar supporting cast too; Jennifer Lopez is not normally someone I'd rate very highly but she delivers some strong work as the doggedly determined Federal Marshall and shares great chemistry with Clooney. It's the dialogue and interplay between all of these characters that's one of the films major highlights and it provide numerous light, entertaining moments.

However, these moments are balanced out with a well judged element of danger.

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For the most part, the personalities seem flawed and comical but Don Cheadle's chillingly psychotic Snoopy Miller, in particular, is a sobering reminder of what's at stake and what some of these career criminals are capable of. Despite the story predominantly taking place amongst unsavoury criminals, you could say that this is as much as a romantic drama as it is a crime drama and Soderbergh handles them both and the comedy elements with a deftness. The non-linear approach demands a certain concentration as it zips back and forth while teasingly bringing everything together.

When you talk about the post-modern cool of 90's crime movies then this is certainly worthy of inclusion. Crime may be the angle of it's characters but the real crime was this being overlooked upon it's release. It didn't do well at the box-office and many have yet to still uncover this gem.

out of sight

Having been well versed in the work of Elmore Leonard over the years, I have to say that Soderbergh and screenwriter Scott Frank do an exemplary job here. Adaptations of Leonard's work have rarely been better. Of Steven Soderbergh's more well known films, I can't believe it took me so long to finally see this.


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They have a chance encounter one of the more unique 'meet cutes' in cinema that sees them trying to have a romantic relationship with one another. There's a big problem, though, and that is the fact that Jack's a career bank robber who has just broken out of jail, and Karen's a deputy federal marshal who just stumbled right up onto the escape attempt.

Out of Sight - Wikipedia

The two have an undeniable attraction to one another, and that's a big part of the fun and charm of things, especially since the two are so committed to their polar opposite lifestyles. Even as Karen is hot on Jack's trail as he goes out for more capers, they manage to try to make their conflict work. According to Soderbergh, "What happened was I spent some time with [Clooney and Bullock] and they actually did have a great chemistry.

But it was for the wrong movie. They really should do a movie together, but it was not Elmore Leonard energy. The character of Foley appealed to Clooney, who as a boy had considered as heroes the bank robbers in movies, citing "the Cagneys and the Bogarts , Steve McQueen and all those guys, the guys who were kind of bad and you still rooted for them.

And when I read this, I thought, 'This guy is robbing a bank but you really want him to get away with it. Soderbergh cites Nicolas Roeg 's film Don't Look Now as the primary influence on how he approached the love scene between Foley and Sisco: We had to mix it up and have you feel like you were more in their heads. After Michael Keaton was cast as the detective Nicolette in Jackie Brown , Universal subsequently cast him for a cameo in the same role in Out of Sight.

While Miramax Films owned the rights to the character, due to the fact that Jackie Brown went into production first, director Quentin Tarantino felt it was imperative that Miramax not charge Universal for using the character, allowing the character's appearance without Miramax receiving financial compensation. Nicolette appears in only one brief scene, whereas the character was a much more substantial element of Jackie Brown.

DJ David Holmes was originally hired to write a few sections of the film's theme music.


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    • Soderbergh liked what he did so much that he had Holmes score the rest of the film. Holmes spent six weeks working to hour days to finish the score in time for the film's release. Out of Sight received critical acclaim. The site's critical consensus reads: Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film three and a half out of four stars and praised Clooney's performance, stating: A lot of actors who are handsome when young need to put on some miles before the full flavor emerges Here Clooney at last looks like a big screen star; the good-looking leading man from television is over with".

    Lopez has her best movie role thus far, and she brings it both seductiveness and grit; if it was hard to imagine a hard-working, pistol-packing bombshell on the page, it couldn't be easier here". They don't make movies like this anymore, in this overcalculated and overtested era". Making adroit use of complex flashbacks, freeze frames and other stylistic flourishes, he's managed to put his personal stamp on the film while staying faithful to the irreplaceable spirit of the original". We'll put it together a piece at a time. David Holmes worked six weeks of to hour days to get the soundtrack done.

    Albert Brooks explained to Backstage that while he had played a villain before his turn as mobster Bernie Rose in Drive , his character Richard Ripley in Out of Sight was not feared at all. He needed protection in prison, he needed people to stick up for him, he had security guards around him.

    He wasn't a guy who would take action himself; he paid people to do it. So I've never played a guy who you wouldn't want to cross physically, for your own safety. Scott Frank was stuck on how to conclude the film for months, not wanting to end it with Sisco shooting Foley and going back to Florida like it did in the book. Out of desperation, Frank called the author for advice, when he was told their conversation would have to be cut short because he was about to talk to a Texas man who had broken out of prison more than a dozen times.

    Frank inquired further, then wrote a new ending that saw Foley meeting the multi-time prison-breaking Hejira Henry Samuel L. Jackson on the way to jail.