Burn After Reading
After their turgid (and grossly overrated) adaptation of Cormac McCarthyâs No Country For Old Men, The Coen Brothers got back to doing what they do best with this 2008 effort, concocting an original, quirky story and making (in this case) a pretty decent film out of it, even as certain story elements harken back to their existential masterpiece The Big Lebowski, but without quite the same level of success. The story concerns a CIA analyst (John Malkovich) who quits his job after being demoted and starts to work on his âmemoirsâ, only to have the (mostly useless) info contained therein fall into the hands of a number of characters who fumble about trying to gain some sort of profit for themselves. If anyone gives a standout performance here, it is certainly the Malkovich himself, dominatingly hilarious in the opening scenes before being given more of a sideline role for the rest of the film while the Coens focus on the rest of the players: George Clooney as a sex-crazed, philandering husband seems at times to be doing a parody of his (possibly manufactured) playboy image, even showing himself to be such a fornication fiend that he constructs a bizarre rocking chair / Sybian machine contraption that makes the viewer drop his jaw; Frances McDormand as the painfully naĂŻve gym employee who wants nothing more than to get her liposuction operation and will stop at nothing to get it, lacks the warmth of her female sheriff in Fargo but still is quirky enough to keep you watching; Tilda Swinton as Malkovichâs cheating wife turns the shrill, bitchy theatrics into high gear, especially when dealing with her broken-spirited husband; Richard Jenkins is arguably the most sympathetic turn as McDormandâs boss who constantly carries a torch for her and gets caught up in the lunacy; and Brad Pitt as the vain, narcissistic co-worker at the gym seems funny on the surface until we realize that there is NOTHING underneath, an ill-defined performance where he plays a physical fitness nut as an airheaded surfer stoner type, and thatâs about the extent of it. All in all, it never quite gels as well as some of the Coenâs better works, but is still gutsy enough to maintain a dark, cynical tone up until the end, depicting a world where 95% of the people in it are complete idiots and thus making things that much harder for the remaining 5%. Besides Malkovich, a few other things resonate a strong comedy punch, such as Swintonâs delightfully slimy divorce lawyer (âI would normally recommend that you try to salvage things with your husband, BUTâŚâ) to a couple of characters being so ignorant that when Malkovich refuses their ransom demands, they go ahead and turn his info over to the Russian embassy because, well, Russians hate Americans, right? Certainly it builds to a boiling point, with Malkovichâs rage, Clooneyâs paranoia, McDormandâs ignorance, Swintonâs vindictiveness, and Pittâs absolute stupidity resulting in a series of events that at least FEELS original and keeps the viewer watching, which in many ways is the highest compliment that one can pay a movie. Overall, while not a bad movie, still feels like something its genius makers came up with on an off dayâŚ
7/10