Steven Soderbergh, director of Ocean's Thirteen, is like a vendor who came out with a great idea. His original product sold well, and he basked in the glow of success for a while. But alas, the market is fickle, so he figured he needed to do something new and different with the next version. When his new offering turned out to be too different from what his patrons expected, it met with less enthusiasm. Having learned his lesson, he tries yet another version -- only his third one is much the same as the original, just a bit more streamlined.

Will his customers be happy and come knocking at his door for his newest offering? Personally, I thought  Ocean's Eleven, Soderbergh's first Ocean's movie, was all right, and I didn't feel let down by its sequel, Ocean's Twelve, but that was not the general consensus. From what I remember, the first movie was a hit, but the second movie is more or less spoken about in hushed tones.

I think Soderbergh and his gang must have felt a little  sting from the reception of Ocean's Twelve, even if  they saw the series as something of a goofy lark. It's obvious Soderbergh's heart is more in his small projects like Bubble or The Good German, with the Ocean's movies providing something of a bankroll fallback. As such, the Ocean's films have been rather open about how surface glittery they are -- with big stars like George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon walking around sparkling locales wearing great-looking suits and cracking wise, who needed anything more? In fact, these movies are so in-your-face about how easy and slick they are that I can't help picturing Soderbergh directing them with an everpresent smirk.

Unfortunately, with the second movie, Soderbergh  tried to get a little too smart. His penchant for Hollywood inside jokes ran a bit too far when he introduced that Julia Roberts joke (where the characters claimed her character looked like Julia Roberts and tried to pass her off as the actress) on top of a limiting plot involving most of the Ocean's Eleven guys landing in jail. So what's his solution for the third movie?

Make it just like the first. The only major difference seems to be the lack of the romantic subplot (in the first movie, it was between Clooney and Roberts; Roberts is MIA in Ocean's Thirteen). But otherwise, the new movie wastes no time giving its viewers what they want. Immediately, there's a motive in place for another grand heist scheme. The fellas work out the system and the nuts and bolts of what they need to do, bantering smartly all the way. Las Vegas returns as the setting of choice, with all its allure flashing so temptingly on screen.

Ocean's Thirteen, like Ocean's Eleven, is about enjoying the process of watching these smooth cons  getting away with what they do. They rely on their innate charms to win us over, and we need no more qualifications than that to root for them (an egomaniacal antagonist, in this case played by Al Pacino, doesn't hurt). The humor is good, and the whole thing rolls like a well-oiled machine.

I didn't care much for the first movie because of that kind of shallowness, but I've learned to, um, appreciate it more now, so I enjoyed Ocean's Thirteen more than the others. It's probably not "better" than the first movie, but I'll predict those who found the second one lacking will applaud the return to form. I'm curious now to see if this third film achieves enough popular success to prevent Soderbergh from turning Ocean's Fourteen into a rehash of Ocean's Twelve.

(Released by Warner Bros. and rated "PG-13" for brief sensuality.)

Review also posted at www.windowtothemovies.com.