When Steven Sodebergh "retired" from film-making in 2013, it wasn't expected to last. IN the last couple of years, he's still managed to direct 20 episodes of a TV series ("The Knick"), a play ("The Library") and was cinematographer and editor on "Magic Mike XXL". He's now back as if he's never been away with a light piece, something intended to be crowdpleasing, along the lines of the "Oceans 11" films with a high profile cast pulling off a heist - in this case, the somewhat more downmarket cash palace of the Charlotte Motor Speedway during Nascar season.
In many ways this has some of the overtones of a Coen Brothers joint - the key performers get a chance to be wildly quirky yet human in a story that celebrates their personalities as much as it celebrates anything relating to the plot. The two Logan brothers at the centre are the thoroughly humanly engaging Channing Tatum, and the mordantly deadpan Adam Driver - there's a lovely chemistry between the two of them. The biggest guest-star is Daniel Craig as explosives expert Joe Bang, who lights up the screen with pure acting glee. Riley Keogh sticks out as the Logan sister who assists with the plan, a model of common-sense in the middle of various ridiculous schemes.
Sodebergh is a master of telling a complex plot with style and simplicity, and this is no different. Perhaps the last third gets a little lackadaisical with the resolution (which doesn't go at all how most audiences may be expecting it to go) and it is very much a case of a film getting by on thoroughgoing charm rather than deep themes, but in a film as pleasurable as this, who gives a damn.
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