Taken on the whole, Steven Soderbergh’s career has been very hit or miss.
But during a four-year period (1998 through 2001), Soderbergh was doing work that was arguably as good as anyone in the business (namely “The Limey,” “Out of Sight,” “Erin Brockovich,” “Ocean’s Eleven” and “Traffic”).
Since then, however, his work has been uneven at best.
Many are high on his newest film, “The Informant!,” which arrived in theaters Sept. 17 (find our review here).
First Showing recently sat down to talk with Soderbergh, and among the highlights were:
Soderbergh on Matt Damon and George Clooney — A lot of people, not just actors, a lot of people get frozen in the moment of their first success and they’re very afraid of doing anything that will screw around with that, and Matt and George are the kind of people that are — they’re too intellectually restless to get stuck like that.
Soderberg on “Knockout” — I’m building a whole movie around Gina Carano … I just felt like, why aren’t there more women around who can carry a gun? … Let’s build something around her and sort of wind her in to it and take advantage of what she is and what she can do. That’s kind of fun. It can be scary and for people who are financing films it’s a sort of nervous-making proposition because there’s not a built-in movie audience for her but in this case I feel she’s actually got– she has a following and I feel like she’s someone who I think is going to emerge in some way and I feel like well, let’s be the first because if it wasn’t us, I feel like it would be somebody would be coming to her and saying, “You should be in a movie.”
Soderbergh on giving up on directing — If my plan goes the way I hope, it will be a minimum of 25 movies, maybe more. That’s plenty.
For the complete interview, head to First Showing. There is a lot more to read there, because whether the movie he is promoting is good, bad or otherwise, Soderbergh himself remains quite the interesting personality.
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The Limey is one of my 5 favorite movies of all time.
Although he really can be uneven, when he’s on, he’s really on. I would hate to lose him as a director.