Ocean’s Eleven is a caper film with comedy (i.e. it is a film about thievery that you laugh at and enjoy). The “crew” gets along and doesn’t backstab or betray each other (i.e. no drama). This film by comparison is a caper film with dramody (i.e. it is a film about thievery that you laugh at and enjoy in which the crew betrays and backstabs one another since the caper in itself is an act of backstabbing and betrayal). Very interesting. I wouldn’t say the funniest things were in the trailer, but the majority of the funny moments from the movie were in the trailer. Oliver Platt was especially hilarious and plays the biggest comedic role in the movie (despite the reviews saying John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton are the funniest thing since sliced bread). Cusack and Thornton are funny (practically everybody gets to crack a joke at one point or another), but they are more dramatic fodder for this exploration of people who are suddenly “acting nice around Christmas time.”

This is Charlie (Cusack). He’s a very talented (if timid) mob lawyer*. He just stole 2 million dollars from his mobster employer on Christmas Eve. His best friend (Platt) is married to his ex-wife (whom he slept with before the marriage ended). He has no regrets (his father, a moral cop, died at 54 and his uncle, a fraternal twin and evil sum-bitch, died the next day) and doesn’t care what happens…until it starts to happen.

* Leo Bloom anyone? Actually I find it hilarious that one of the trailers before this movie was The Producers…but maybe it’s just me.