Is Ocean's Eleven the best movie made about Las Vegas

A.� The remake of the 1960 movie Ocean's Eleven is a continuation of Hollywood's fascination with Vegas. The original rat pack film, which starred Frank Sinatra, helped establish the city as a playground for glamorous people, erring on the side of lawlessness. The 1960 version was the first to star Sinatra with his cronies, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop.

The latest version stars George Clooney, who takes on the Sinatra role as Danny Ocean, who handpicks a mob of 11 to try to rob millions of dollars from Las Vegas casinos. There's an impressive line-up of Hollywood celebrities, including Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Bernie Mac, Don Cheadle, Andy Garcia and Julia Roberts.

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Q.� Which other movies have focused on Vegas life

A.� Most Las Vegas movies are shaped by nostalgia for the city's criminal past, with gambling and greed as consistent themes.

The Martin Scorsese hit of 1995, Casino, is set in the 1970s and shows how money works in Vegas. It also includes a Sammy Davis Jr. song from Ocean's Eleven.

Movies which have concentrated on gambling include Robert Altman's California Split, Ryan O'Neal in Fever Pitch and Bugsy, made in 1991, which depict Vegas as a gambling palace in the 1940s.

It's also shown as a place of greed and immorality - gambler Robert Redford offered a million dollars to sleep with Demi Moore in Indecent Proposal, and John Cleese was an oily money-obsessed maniac in the comedy Rat Race.

Directors use the city to show the ups and downs of life dependent on gambling. Swingers was a film about twenty-somethings in a low-rent gaming house, and Lost in America, showed something of real-life horror was a housewife gambled away the family's entire savings.

Elizabeth Berkley played prostitute Elizabeth Shue in a doom-ridden Leaving Las Vegas with Nicholas Cage.

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Q.� Some films have been based there, but not actually made there, haven't they

A.� The neon lights of downtown Vegas and the infamous Strip have been a favourite with directors for years. George Stevens shot The Only Game in Town (1970) in Paris, starring Warren Beatty and Elizabeth Taylor, because Taylor wanted to be near Richard Burton.

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Q.� What about Elvis movies

A.� Elivis Presley starred in Viva Las Vegas in 1963 and became its biggest and most famous celebrity on and off the stage in the 1970s. There have been dozens of movies made in the city about the King - Honeymoon in Vegas in 1992 featured a plane-load of sky-diving Elvis impersonators and 3,000 from Graceland, shot last year, shows Elvis-impersonating casino robbers.

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By Katharine MacColl