Burn After Reading

Directed and Written by Joel and Ethan Coen
Starring Brad Pitt, George Clooney, John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, Richard Jenkins

Review by Junior.

Joel and Ethan Coen are amazingly talented filmmakers who produce different kinds of movies, seemingly picking projects based on whatever strikes their fancy, and they adapt their filmic style and tone to the subject. One consistent aspect of their disparate films is the frequent use of a few actors, in this case Coen faves George Clooney and Frances McDormand. (Of course you could be fooled by Clooney's presence--you might think you're watching a Steven Soderburgh movie.)

Although I am always aware of the Coen brother's talent, I don't always love their films. I love Blood Simple, Raising Arizona, Fargo, O Brother Where Art Thou?, and No Country For Old Men. Not so much Miller's Crossing, The Hudsucker Proxy and Intolerable Cruelty. I'm afraid Burn After Reading falls into the latter category. Good actors, interesting plot---eh.

Okay, the plot is about a couple of fitness club employees (Pitt and McDormand) who find a computer disc belonging to Malkovich which they believe contains top secret intelligence and their attempts at extorting money from someone (anyone!) in exchange for it. Meanwhile there is some bed-swapping among the characters, Clooney and Swinton included. All the characters are loopy or strange in some way, and the movie is sometimes funny, the plot is engaging...and there is the occasional shocking Coen brothers moment of violence.

The primary problem with the film is that none of the characters are really worth caring about. The most enjoyable, funniest and probably the nicest (if stupidest) character in the movie is Brad Pitt. Unfortunately, there is not enough of him. The rest of the characters are all silly, stupid, shallow, selfish or angry and amoral in their own ways, all flawed, and presented so evenly that the audience doesn't know who they are supposed to care about. Since none of the characters is especially sympathetic one ends up not caring about any of them.

So if we don't care about the characters, we are left with only the story to entertain us, and perhaps a devilish enjoyment of watching the plot machine, as it starts spinning, chew all these idiots up. Unfortunately, it's not enough. For a movie which depends so strongly on the plot the movie takes an odd sidestep at the end and does not directly show the culmination of the story. We are told what happened by a third party, which is kind of funny but ultimately unsatisfying.

Story---7, for quirky originality
Acting---7
Look---6
Overall---6.75