Review: Burn After Reading

Burn After Reading

OPENING DATE: 09/12/2008

STUDIO: Focus Features

TRAILER: Trailer

ACCOMPLICES: Official Site

The Charge
Intelligence is relative.

Opening Statement
Since the 1970s, the paranoid political thriller has been a popular genre. There have been quite a few good movies to come from this genre, such as The Day of the Jackal, Three Days of the Condor, and Syriana. In these movies, everything is a conspiracy, and nothing is a coincidence. Now, the infamous Coen Brothers have made a film using similar elements in which nothing is a conspiracy, and everything is a coincidence. It may make for slightly less thrilling cinema, but it is a view of the world that I happen to find a little more convincing. It’s also a heck of a lot funnier.


Ever since they began with Blood Simple, Joel and Ethan Coen have always included a man behind a desk in each of their films. These men have their own unique personalities, but there is a common thread. The more you listen to these men talk, the more you realize that they have gone completely off the deep end. Think of the studio boss in Barton Fink, or The Big Lebowski in The Big Lebowski, or Jerry Lundegard in Fargo. Burn After Reading is a film that takes place within a world where there are many such men: Washington, D.C.


Facts of the Case
The film opens with one of these men (David Rasche), a CIA official who is dealing with the unpleasant task of firing one of his operatives. The operative is Osborne Cox (John Malkovich), a wanna-be intellectual with a hot temper and a considerable drinking problem. Cox responds very badly to the news of his dismissal, and determines to deal with his feelings by writing a memoir (or as he oh-so-carefully puts it, “mem-wah”). Unfortunately, his mem-wah accidentally gets lost, and it is somehow found by a couple of employees at a local gym.

One of the employees is Linda (Frances McDormand), a very friendly woman with a lot of insecurity issues. She is determined to get several cosmetic surgeries in order to make herself look better, and is deeply saddened when she learns that her “Mickey Mouse insurance company” won’t pay for such operations. The other employee is Chad (Brad Pitt), a pop-music loving, bubble-gum chewing fellow who behaves exactly like you would expect someone named Chad to behave. Chad is thrilled to find the disc, and believes that he and Linda can gain some sort of reward by blackmailing Cox. Chad’s plans are barely worthy of being actually called “plans,” they mostly consist of squinting a lot and repeating Osborne’s name in a Clint Eastwood rasp. Osborne is married to a particularly icy woman (Tilda Swinton) who happens to be having an affair with a married man named Harry (George Clooney). Harry winds up getting involved with Linda, and… well, I’ll let the film itself unfold the complications from there.


The Evidence
This is a superbly crafted movie, and it is also a funny movie. The odd thing is that it is crafted like a thriller and acted like a comedy. The technical credits are far sharper than you might expect for a movie with as much silliness as this one. Emmanuel Lubeski’s cinematography is superb, as is the slightly satirical Carter Burwell score that could easily slip into a film like Syriana without anyone really noticing. The fact that such stars as Clooney (Syriana), Malkovich (In the Line of Fire), Pitt (Spy Game), and Swinton (Michael Clayton) are involved also adds to the feeling that we should be taking this a lot more seriously than it actually deserves to be taken.

It takes a while to get used to the film’s unusual tone, but once you do, I suspect you’ll have a great deal of fun. The Coens are nearly unparalleled when it comes to casting, and they select just the right actor for each role once again here. My favorite performance comes from Malkovich, who would probably come across as a very well-mannered and intelligent man if only people weren’t constantly doing things that disrupted his good manners and sense of intelligence. I was also fond of the pair of exchanges between David Rasche and J.K. Simmons, which are so perfectly timed that they had me doubling over. Clooney gets to deliver several absurdly funny moments, and McDormand demonstrates that she can be immensely likable even when she is playing a complete bubblehead. Speaking of bubbleheads, Brad Pitt… well… done, I think. Richard Jenkins also has a nice turn as the most sympathetic character in the film, a gym manager who spends his days hopelessly pining after the clueless Linda.


Closing Statement
If you’re one of the folks who became a Coen convert only after seeing No Country for Old Men, you may not particularly care for what they’re up to here. If you’re a fan of their films like The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, and… oh, Barton Fink, I think… then this may very well be up your alley. Nonetheless, this film doesn’t quite fit as neatly into the Coen filmography as you might think. It’s not quite as obviously silly as their comedies, and yet it’s also sillier than all of them. It’s not as serious as their dramas, yet there are deep truths here buried beneath (or perhaps thrown above) the fray. Really, the whole thing is just one big joke, with the punchline being delivered beautifully in the final scene. Would you pay eight dollars to hear a good joke that takes 96 minutes to tell? Personally, I’m looking forward to hearing it again.


The Verdict
9/10

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