One Coin, Two Sides

Steven Soderbergh is a frustrating filmmaker. There is no better modern filmmaker at exploring what is possible with film direction and storytelling but rarely do these explorations amount to a great film. The concepts are interesting but overall his films seem to lack emotion, at least for me. One exception to this is his adaptation of Elmore Leonard's Out of Sight,
where Soderbergh was able to pair some of his editing and directorial concepts with an already solid story. There are a number of standout moments but none so wonderful as "Gary" and "Celeste's" encounter in a hotel bar. No doubt Soderbergh felt inspired by Nicholas Roeg's Don't Look Now in which Julia Christie and Donald Sutherland engage in a similarly edited love scene. However, the nature of these scenes and what it says about the respective couples' relationships is quite different. Roeg intercuts footage of Christie and Sutherland engaged in erotic and very realistic sex with images of the couple getting dressed postcoitally for dinner. Particularly, I find it interesting that the couple begin their pre-dinner preparations nude, completely comfortable with each other. This juxstaposition helps establish the intimacy and familiarity between them as a married couple. Whereas, Soderbergh's use of this technique, intertwining Clooney and Lopez flirting in a hotel bar with footage of their post-drink affair, exudes sensuality and sexual tension, both slowly undressing, metaphorically and physically. Two of the greatest love scenes using the same technique to very different ends.
**Unfortunately, I am unable to find a clip of the scene from Don't Look Now.