Rating: 4 Pulses
Starring Francis McDormand, George Clooney, Brad Pitt
Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
Rated R
Fresh on the heels of their huge hit No Country for Old Men, Burn After Reading feels like the trademark Coen Brothers curveball.
This espionage thriller comedy does start a little slow, introducing the audience to a ’league of morons’ that seemingly have little to do with one another. Osborne Cox (Malkovich) is an ornery, alcoholic CIA analyst whose recent demotion inspires him to begin writing a memoir. His wife (Swinton) accidentally makes a copy while trying to secure his financials for the divorce she’s secretly planning. Harry Pfarrer (Clooney) is her lascivious lover, a man who recycles his one-liners with the myriad women he courts, including his wife. Linda Litzke (McDormand) and Chad Feldheimer (Pitt) are two gym employees who stumble upon Cox’s memoirs.
Thus begins a series of debacles that even the CIA can’t untangle. The Coen Brothers skewer the political thriller genre in this irreverent black comedy. None of the characters have any redeeming qualities. Each is selfish, paranoid and stupid, and the Coens do a lovely job of switching the audience’s perspective from that of an innocent outsider to reluctant participant. When you realize that you can relate to such fools, the only thing to do is laugh.
And the film is quite funny. The writing pokes fun at the insanity of human desires while never passing judgment.
Burn After Reading is the Coen Brothers at their most mischievous. Immensely bleak, yet lighthearted, the world the Coens create is one of optimistic desperation and clumsy violence. After this film, the clich’s of any Bourne movie, etc., will lose much of their weight. Though not as classic as The Big Lebowski, Burn After Reading is what would happen if the Dude and friends went blue collar and moved to D.C.
