Well, the Las Vegas swindle crew is back in full force in this threequel. The name of the game is getting even. Danny Ocean (George Clooney), Rusty Ryan (Brad Pitt) and the gang would have only one reason to pull off their most ambitious and riskiest casino heist and the reason is to defend one of their own.

The ruthless hotel and casino owner Willy Bank (Al Pacino) double-crossed Danny's friend and mentor Reuben Tishkoff (Elloitt Gould) out of his money and his share of the new establishment, putting the distraught Reuben in a hospital bed in critical condition and suffering from depression.

Willy Bank made a mistake, because he may have taken down one of the original Ocean's eleven, but the others are left standing. They vowed to get even by taking down Willy and his new place called The Bank.

Their plan is twofold. First they will ruin him financially by turning the tables on the precept that the house always wins. All they have to do manipulate the dice that are being made in Mexico. Second is to simulate an earthquake to give them time to break Willy's computerized security system and steal his precious diamonds showcased under tight security. These diamonds are payment to Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia), Danny's arch enemy. In this caper Danny and Terry work together because Willy is Terry's competition on the strip. Besides Danny needs Terry's money to pull off the heist and Willy's diamonds will be the repayment.

As the grand opening of The Bank begins, Linus Caldwell (Matt Damon) is sent in to compromise Abigail Sponder (Ellen Barkin) who is Willy Bank's right-hand woman. Matt Damon and Ellen Barkin share a bit of onscreen chemistry. Barkin plays more than just a sexy middle-aged woman on screen, in fact hers is a quite funny and alluring character. Of course Al Pacino is a master of his craft no matter the genre. If you're looking for good gags, cool action, and witty dialogue this is the movie to watch. With supporting cast members Don Cheadle, Bernie Mac, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Eddie Jemison, Shaobo Qin, Eddie Izzard, and the great veteran actor/comedian Carl Reiner, this is a fun-filled movie. In my opinion this is the best Ocean's episode out of the three films.

Directed by: Steven Soderbergh
Running time: 113 minutes
Release date: June 8, 2007
Genres: Action/Adventure, Thriller, Crime/Gangster and Sequel
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
MPAA Rating: PG-13

There’s a point in one of the interviews with a director of Darfur Diaries: Message From Home in the special features section of the DVD, where she mentions one of the bitter ironies of the crises in Darfur. A group of dignitaries from the international community had come together to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda and apologize for having allowed it to happen.

As they were all standing up there swearing that they would never let something like that happen again and how they would be super vigilant to prevent it, the government of Sudan was busy bombing and slaughtering its own people in the province of Darfur.

Darfur Diaries: Message From Home was shot in 2004 by three young film makers who traveled to Darfur on their own and spent time in both the Northern and Southern areas of the province, and in refugee camps in the neighbouring country of Chad. Here, they spent time interviewing the people who had been affected by the attacks. Burnt out houses stand as mute testimony to the bombing raids conducted by the government against its own citizens.

Even as they filmed, an Anatolov bomber flew overhead dropping bombs randomly on the countryside. Parents cried out to children “don’t run, sit down under the trees so they can’t see you.” The pilots of the bombers circle around and target movement and release their bombs killing indiscriminately. Livestock, humans, it doesn’t seem to matter as long as the people and their abilities to survive are destroyed.

Just like the genocides that have been conducted all over the world — from North America to Asia — the theory goes that to completely destroy a people is to destroy their means of survival. With the natives of North America, it was taking away their food supply by exterminating it. With the people of Darfur, the policy seems to be to destroy their villages and steal their livestock as well as killing them.

After the bombers, the strategy of the government was to send in both the Sudanese army and vigilante groups to kill, rape, and steal from the people. Families were exterminated and survivors were forced to flee, after watching their loved ones killed in front of them. The excuse the government continues to make for these attacks is the existence of the Sudanese Liberation Army.

They conveniently forget that the rebel army only formed in response to increasing discrimination against Africans in Sudan, and to the attacks upon their villages by the government forces. What little that the media reported on what was happening in Darfur was to ape what the government said — not bothering to find out for themselves what the real story was.

What’s wonderful about Darfur Diaries is that the only times politics is mentioned is in the interviews with the filmmakers in the special features. For the people on the ground, what matters is what has happened to them and being given opportunity to tell their stories. From the young boy who looks into the camera and talks of watching his brother being shot, to the mothers talking about their babies and their injuries.

The filmmakers interview children who draw pictures of men on camels and horses firing guns; of soldiers in jeeps firing guns; and planes dropping bombs on villages and setting them on fire. They draw pictures of people running away with their arms in the air — fleeing from men with guns and swords who are charging on horses. They draw pictures of dead people laid out on the ground.

Sudan has long been comprised of two distinct Muslim populations, Arab and African. According to the people interviewed here, it has a long history of the two races co-existing peacefully with intermarriages being commonplace. Only since the coup that brought the existing government into power have measures been taken against the majority African population to reduce their means of making a livelihood. There were occasional disputes about grazing rights but the people interviewed in this movie claim they were always settled amicably.

Now however, the government has created a racial war to keep a majority population in check. But not even within the minority Arab population is there unanimity for this war. It appears that aside from the government and it’s army – the only people who support the war are the crooks, rapists, and miserable excuses for human beings who raid the villages after the bombing raids.

The government started attacking the Africans by cutting funding to the village schools, until there was no money to pay for teachers and supplies. They also arrested all the teachers on charges of treason and tortured them. One man interviewed showed the scars where he had been beaten with bricks by his guards and told about other teachers still in jail.

What’s wondrous is the lack of anger displayed by the Africans towards the Arab population of Sudan in general. As one puts it, the government is using the Arab people like a weapon and doesn’t really care about them anymore than they care about us. In fact, according to the Sudanese Liberation Army, there is extensive intermingling between the two peoples in villages to the north. Just as many Arabs are dieing as Africans.

Nobody seems to want to venture as to why this has happened. But in some ways the why is not as important as the fact that it is happening. A government is systematically killing a segment of its own population without remorse or hesitation. They are destroying whole villages and forcing people to leave their homes for any shelter they can find elsewhere.

To me it seems obvious why the government is doing this – they want the land for the people they would prefer to have it. Just like everywhere else that indigenous people have been inconvenient enough to be living where the government wants to make use of the land, the quickest and easiest way of dealing with the matter is to kill or force them off the land.

Darfur Diaries: Message From Home is wonderful in its simplicity. The people tell their stories of what happened to them, tell you about themselves and their families, and are completely matter of fact. These are the faces of the people we never see in the news stories, and the voices we never hear.

Who better to tell the story of what is happening to them than the people themselves. This movie acts as a direct pipeline from them to whoever will listen.

Don’t you think you owe it to them to listen?

Richard Marcus is a long-haired Canadian iconoclast who writes reviews and opines on the world as he sees it at Leap In The Dark and Epic India.

If ever there was a pointless documentary made about an oddly obsessed individual and a quest that does not seem to have any real worth, or an end for that matter, this is it. I have to wonder what possessed this man to make him want to go on this particular journey. This is a a movie that I cannot really make a good argument to watch this movie, but if you happen to start watching it, there is a very good chance that you will not be able to look away. So, if you have ever wanted to know what it was like to drive around the country and drink gallons of coffee, Starbucking is the movie for you.

Starbucking is a document of a man named Winter (yes, just Winter) who has set out to visit each and every Starbuck’s coffee shop in the world. It is a quest that has lasted for the past ten years, and has had him visiting well over one thousand of the shops at a clip of 20-30 a day at some point. It plays out like a cross of the charm of Supersize Me and the obsessive-compulsiveness of Grizzly Man, without the doctors and without becoming coffee flavored bear cuisine.

The movie does not go after the evils of corporate expansion, nor is it a study about the value of the food and drink offered by the chain. It is about a man who may, or may not, have some sort of mental issue. It is brought up that he may suffer from OCD, and it is even suggested that he may be bi-polar.

Like I said, this is a movie that is hard to look away from. It does not take you very far into the minds of men, just a charismatic individual who spends most of his camera time hopped up on caffeine. He is a truly odd individual, and is a good example of the effects that caffeine can have on a body in such high quantities. Watch as Winter dances in line, rubs his hands together, gets a caffeine crazed look in his eyes, runs down streets and through traffic, and just jitters his way through the 73 minute documentary. I cannot say that I learned much about Winter, other than that he seems to obsess about this to the level that any type of relationship he has, or attempts to have suffers in the end. To that end, Starbucking gives you a look inside the life of man that begins and ends with Starbucks coffee, the occasional strip club, and a man who does not seem to have much going for him outside of this quest and the shallow spiritualism that seems to have grown out of his never ending desire to visit all of the shops.

The DVD is presented in the original 1.33:1 aspect ratio of the guerilla documentary. It is shot in whatever light is available, so the source quality is suspect at times, but the transfer is clean and free of any technical issues. The audio is a fine sounding stereo mix. As for extras, seven deleted scenes, and a commentary track with Winter and director Bill Tangeman which is an intriguing extension of the neverending pointlessness of the quest.

Bottomline. This is a strange film, if you start, you will finish, however you will question why you watched it, why he is doing this, and why the movie was made. I cannot recommend that you buy this, but if you happen to Netflix it, you could do worse. Winter is a kind of sad personality, although he will always have a friend at the next Starbucks.

Mildly Recommended.

Christopher Beaumont spends much of his time writing about entertainment when he isn’t sitting in a movie theater. He is known around the office as the “Movie Guy” and is always ready to talk about his favorite form of entertainment and offer up recommendations. Interests include science fiction, horror, and metal music. His writings can be found at Draven99’s Musings, as well as Film School Rejects.