Top 5: Steven Soderbergh Movies

Director Steven Soderbergh has always done his own thing. After breaking out of the indie scene with Sex,Lies, and Videotape Soderbergh has spent most of the late nineties and 2000s making small stylish films with reasonable budgets and a stable of big name actors while earning enough good will and box office bang with the Ocean's Eleven trilogy. Now after a brief retirement, Soderbergh is back with the critically acclaimed heist comedy Logan Lucky. So as a refresher for Soderbergh's style and sense of humor we've picked five of the director's best.

#5 Side Effects

Twisty thrillers just aren't made by Hollywood studios nowadays unless you have a dedicated director with a killer script and Side Effects has precisely that. The movie centers around Dr. Jonathan Banks (Jude Law), a psychiatrist that attempts to help a young couple Martin and Emily (Channing Tatum and Rooney Mara) with the Emily's ongoing anxiety. What follows is a mystery about hidden intentions, corporate espionage, and physician responsibility that keeps the surprises coming until the film's end.

#4 The Informant!

This film gets a lot of divisive responses for two big reasons. First and foremost, this is an offbeat comedy about understatement and the darkly hilarious knowledge that this is based on a true story. The second reason is because this is actually a comedy about something. Matt Damon stars as the titular character, a lead executive at an agricultural firm, who intends to improve his position by ratting on his company's corrupt employees. Damon is pitch perfect as a man so awkward that people should spot him as a spy, but then again they might not notice a difference in his odd behavior. However the film's true appeal is in demystifying the idea that all whistle blowers are moral crusaders or heroic figures.

#3 Traffic

Soderbergh's style is never "epic" but this sprawling crime drama about the drug trade is as close as it gets. In it, an interconnected group of cops criminals and their families attempt to capture, evade, or simply stay afloat in a world where danger lurks around every corner. Featuring stellar acting from an Academy Award winning Benicio Del Toro to Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones, the film does an excellent job at showing the shades of grey that populate drug trafficking and enforcement and the circumstances that create monstrous actions.

#2 Ocean's Eleven

A movie so effortlessly cool and fun it's not even fair. The premise is simply as it gets, a infamous thief is fresh out of prison and wants to pull in the score of a lifetime...and possibly get back his wife. Though the heist itself is beautifully planned and executed the movie's true appeal is in watching the team banter back and forth through all of their preparation with a diverse collection actors including heavy hitters like George Clooney and Brad Pitt, Don Cheadle, Bernie Mac, and the Casey Affleck/Scott Caan duo bringing laughs, and a quietly menacing Andy Garcia.

#1 Out of Sight

Ocean's Eleven may be the Soderbergh's most enjoyable movie but Out of Sight is a pitch perfect version of what it sets out to be: a film-noir romance. After a chance meeting during his escape, a thief (George Clooney) begins a flirtation with a U.S. Marshall (Jennifer Lopez) that quickly blossoms into a forbidden romance. While the plot is driven by an ill-conceived heist involving a sinister Don Cheadle, the movie's driving force is the palpable chemistry between Clooney and Lopez including one of the sexiest scenes ever put on screen...and it doesn't even feature nudity. An underrated gem and a personal favorite.