July 9, 2021
When you are a really big fan of an artist – whether it’s a musician, an actor, or a director, you naturally get very excited when you hear about a new project. Witness my giddiness at Bruce Springsteen’s new album last year. With musicians, it can sometimes be years between albums. My favorite band’s last few albums have been released in 2009, 2012, and 2018. Fingers crossed, they have a new one coming soon, but that’s still a long time in between projects. Unfortunately, that’s the case with a lot of musicians, unless your name is Taylor Swift (ahem, three #1 albums in nine months – but you’ve already read my thoughts on her brilliance). That being said, at least with a musician, you can listen to a new album over and over again without getting sick of it. Movies are a different animal. As much as I love certain directors, I’m not going to rewatch the same films multiple times in a short period, especially when there are so many options available at our fingertips. That being said, despite my lengthy watchlist, I may or may not have rewatched Zodiac for the umpteenth time last night. Just because.
Most directors these days take their time in between projects, and even while they are making their films. David Fincher’s Mank came out in late 2020. He’ll start shooting his next picture later this year, so we’ll probably see it in late 2022. Martin Scorsese is on a similar schedule these days. The Irishman came out in late 2019 and he just began principal photography on his next movie, Killers of the Flower Moon, which will likely also be a 2022 release. One of my favorite directors, Quentin Tarantino, is on a much slower pace. His debut film, Reservoir Dogs, came out almost thirty years ago and his last movie, 2019’s Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood was only his 9th feature film. After writing a novelization of Hollywood (just released in paperback), he has no immediate plans for his next movie, which he claims will be his last.
Where am I going with this? I couldn’t help but think of these examples while examining the work of a director who has directed over 30 movies, 20 episodes of an acclaimed television series, a few documentaries, this year’s Oscar ceremony (well, let’s not re-examine that), not to mention other little hobbies and side projects. Yes, apparently Steven Soderbergh either lives in a world with more than 24 hours in a day, or has the strongest work ethic of anyone working in Hollywood today. His latest film, No Sudden Move, debuted on HBO Max last week, and word has it that he has already completed production on his next project.
How does he do it? Efficiency. Plain and simple. He knows the story he wants to tell before he starts filming, usually writing the scripts himself. He doesn’t waste time doing endless numbers of takes, he communicates effectively with his cast and crew, and sometimes plays multiple roles on the pictures. Not only is he the director, but he also serves as the cameraman (sometimes called director of photography or cinematographer) and editor on a number of his films. In recent years, he’ll shoot during the day, edit the footage that night, and take that feedback to the next day’s shoot. He has said in interviews that if he has the technology at his fingertips, he might as well use it. It also helps that most of his films are character stories that are highly dependent on the acting, the story, and the production design. You’re not finding gaudy special effects in a Soderbergh movie. Instead, it’s about the characters and stories, not how many zombies are blown up by the hero of the film.
Top 10 List
I’ve been making my way through gaps that I had in Soderbergh’s catalogue over the last several months, in anticipation of this blog post. There were some nice finds, in particular one that made my top 5, some interesting experiments in film technique that worked, and some that didn’t. Of course, when you churn out as much product as he does, you’re not going to have a 100% success rate. All you need to know is that he is one of the most respected directors in Hollywood who can recruit almost any actor to work with him. It’s no coincidence that some of his frequent collaborators have last names like Clooney, Roberts, Damon, Pitt, Streep, Cheadle, and del Toro. Let’s dive into my 10 favorite Steven Soderbergh movies.
#10 – Sex, Lies and Videotape (1989)
We’ll start my top 10 with the same movie where it all began for Soderbergh, his feature film debut that showed Hollywood that there was a new talent in the industry. Sex, Lies and Videotape was released to critical acclaim, winning the Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival, and the Palm D’Or (Best Picture equivalent) at the Cannes Film Festival, beating Do the Right Thing, among other strong movies. That’s a tough beat for Spike. Not nearly as bad as losing to Driving Miss Daisy at the Oscars, but still…. Soderbergh’s debut represented the independent style of filmmaking that we would see popularized in the 1990s from directors including Kevin Smith, Richard Linklater, and Sofia Coppola. Character-driven stories, tight camera shots, raw cinematography making it feel like real-life, decidedly NOT a special effects blockbuster.
I remember seeing this movie a long time ago, but had very little recollection of the story, or if I even liked it that much. I revisited it recently, in preparation for this post, and found it an impressive product for a debut film, but not necessarily an “all-time great” movie. Don’t get me wrong – it’s very good, but it’s not something I see myself revisiting very often. The film is focused on four characters, intertwined in a most unusual way. Andie McDowell plays a woman unhappy in her marriage and seeing a therapist for her feelings of sexual repression, among other issues. Her husband, played by Peter Gallagher in a slime ball performance, is having an affair with her sister, played by Laura San Giacomo. All is going fine (well, maybe not “fine”) until an old friend of the husband, played by James Spader, shows up and shares his “idiosyncrasies” with the other three characters. You see, he has a little impotence problem, and an obsession with videotaping women talking about their sex lives. Now you probably realize where the movie’s title comes from. This film may not be for everyone, and some of the conversations are made to make the viewer uncomfortable, as Spader pokes and prods at the secrets and lies of the other three characters. Not surprisingly, things start to unravel once the lies are exposed. Spader is excellent in the film, and it’s a nice debut that showed Soderbergh has the chops to tell quality character stories.
#9 – Logan Lucky (2017)
It would be understandable if you’ve never heard of this movie, as it didn’t do very well at the box office, and it’s one of those films where the title isn’t doing anyone any favors. Rumor has it that it was called Hillbilly Heist at one point during development, which would have been a much better title. After becoming frustrated (and maybe a little burned out) about the movie-making process, Soderbergh took a self-imposed “retirement” and did a few television shows and declared his movie career over. That didn’t last long. His “comeback” was Logan Lucky, which could be described as a black sheep cousin to Ocean’s Eleven. Channing Tatum and Adam Driver play brothers who plot to rob the Charlotte Motor Speedway during a large NASCAR race. They assemble a team of misfits, including Daniel Craig (in a role that foreshadows his Southern accent skills we would see in 2019’s Knives Out), and hijinks ensue. The plot points and Soderbergh’s script definitely have elements of the Ocean’s series, and that’s ok. It’s a fun ride, featuring some really good performances, twisty plot turns, and a good payoff ending.
#8 – Behind the Candelabra (2013)
A true measure of a talented director is if an actor will put all of their trust into the hands of the filmmaker and believe in the vision for the project. When you watch a finished movie that works very well, it’s easy to appreciate the craftsmanship of all involved. But for an actor reading a script and having conversations with the director, it’s just a concept on paper. This is the main reason why I was so impressed with Behind the Candelabra, the story of Liberace (portrayed by Michael Douglas in an Emmy-winning transformative role), and his partner / protegee Scott Thorson, played by Matt Damon. Both lead actors took roles that are way outside their comfort zone, but they embrace the challenge, trusting that Soderbergh won’t make this a cartoonish movie. It has its moments of absurdity, but at the heart of the movie is a story of two men’s struggle with their identity, in more ways than one.
I thought about Behind the Candelabra when I recently watched Magic Mike, the 2012 film Soderbergh made about the male stripping industry in Florida. That film featured gutsy performances by Channing Tatum (whose life experience in the industry inspired the story) and Matthew McConaughey, who has shown over and over again that he’s willing to do whatever it takes to make the most of any role. Magic Mike, a film I liked a lot and just missed my top 10, is another example of Soderbergh pushing the boundaries of telling an unconventional story, and actors trusting the director to take their raw and vulnerable performances and make them into a work of art on film, just like Behind the Candelabra.
#7 – Ocean’s Twelve (2004)
It’s rare that the sequel lives up to the original, and I’m not saying that the second film in the Ocean’s series is as good as the first one (we still have five more movies to go here), but this is still a fun sequel. Yes, the plot is somewhat convoluted (and may not all hold together), but Soderbergh gets the band back together for more hijinks and the formula still works. Forced into a new heist to pay back their target from the first film (Terry Benedict, played by Andy Garcia), they set out to steal a rare item, but are outwitted by a legendary thief, the Night Fox. They are then forced into another plot to figure out how to pay off their debt. It’s nice to have the entire cast back for this one, but there are a few subtle differences. Where Ocean’s Eleven had Danny’s love of Tess at the center (or distraction) of the heist, the sequel finds the relationship between Rusty (Brad Pitt) with Europol detective Isabel (played by Catherine Zeta-Jones) front and center. As expected, the plot features some twists and turns you don’t see coming, and an ending that will have you thinking about what you previously saw throughout the movie. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the production design of Ocean’s Twelve, which is a big upgrade over the original. While Vegas looked great on the screen for the first caper, we spend most of the sequel in Europe, primarily (I’m guessing) because Clooney owns a villa in Italy and well, he’s George Clooney and he can influence shooting locations. One last point, which is the highlight of the movie. The scene where Julia Roberts plays Tess impersonating Julia Roberts while meeting with Bruce Willis (playing himself) is the gold standard for celebrity self-awareness of the ridiculousness of Hollywood and their movie stars. Very meta indeed. Well played, Mr. Soderbergh.
#6 – Contagion (2011)
In March 2020 when the sh*t was really hitting the fan, a curious thing happened. The #1 movie on the Apple rental charts for numerous weeks was Contagion, Soderbergh’s 2011 study of what happens when a virus rapidly wreaks havoc on humanity. For some reason, people felt the need to escape the pandemic news on their televisions and phones by watching….a movie about a worldwide pandemic? Not me. Nope. I went “comfort movies” all the way to forget about things. I wrote about that experience here. That being said, I recently found the stomach to revisit Contagion, a film I saw many years ago, and let me tell you a few things. First, it’s an amazing film as both a suspense thriller, and a crazy predictor of the future a decade later. Second, as I watched the movie, I kept asking myself how I would have felt if I had done so in the early days of the pandemic. I don’t think I would have felt so good had I done that. Now, to be fair, the virus in Soderbergh’s story is much deadlier than what we experienced over the last year, but I think without knowing we would be in a much better position a year later, I would have felt more anxiety than I need in a movie.
Like most of Soderbergh’s pictures, Contagion features an ensemble of all-stars, led by Matt Damon (a collaborator on nine of the director’s films. That’s right. Nine!), Kate Winslet, Laurence Fishburne, and Jude Law, among others. Damon plays the father of two children whose wife (Gwyneth Paltrow) succumbs to the deadly virus in the opening moments of the movie. We learn that she may be patient zero, and as we see various cities around the world with people coughing in hospitals, on buses and trains, we know that we are now off to the races. Fishburne and Winslet play scientists from the CDC investigating the origins of the virus and doing everything they can to protect people from contracting it.
It’s impossible to watch Contagion now and not think of the parallels of 2020, but it’s also interesting to compare and contrast. Social unrest: comparable to a degree. Politics trumping public health: spot on. Conspiracy theory lunatics on the internet: way underplayed in the movie (unfortunately). Side note: There was a moment where the head of the conspiracy movement (played by Law in a great performance) confronts a scientist, saying that he’s a journalist who deserves to write about the truth. The scientist (Elliot Gould) says, “You’re a blogger. Blogging is not writing. It’s graffiti with punctuation.” Ooh, that hurts, because it’s true. One laugh out loud moment was when the scientists met with the politicians with safety recommendations, including “social distancing.” When that moment happened, I was like that Leo meme from Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood, pointing at the TV. If you haven’t seen that meme – here is a link to its origin. All kidding aside, now that we’ve been (mostly) vaccinated, and we’re starting to feel a little more normal, I’m here to tell you that it’s safe to watch Contagion again without getting nightmares afterwards.
That’s all for this week. I’ll be back next week for part two of my look at Soderbergh’s career, including some bold choices he has made with different genre types, filmmaking techniques (yes, you can make a feature film in Hollywood on an iPhone), and my five favorite Soderbergh movies. Thanks for reading and if you’d like to be notified of future posts, you can subscribe here.