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Brad Pitt is among a star cast in Burn After Reading |
More hot stuff from talented Coen brothers
BURN AFTER READING
Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
Certificate 15
IN terms of American cities, Washington DC fails to capture the imagination as other metropolises do. It has none of the dash and romance of New York or San Francisco.
Perhaps it’s the fact it’s the centre of government that gives the streets a certain business-like, policy-wonk feel. You can’t imagine it having a Haight Ashbury or Greenwich Village tucked down an alleyway. And it is this down beat, men-in-suits backdrop that the Coen brothers lampoon mercilessly in their new comedy. It provides a canvas for them to crank up their fun-poking of Middle America, and they do so brilliantly.
Burn After Reading is funny – not so much the story, but the little comments on the idiosyncracies of the characters, played by a host of super actors, including Brad Pitt in an almost minor role.
It is hardly vintage Coen fare, failing to reach the heights of No Country For Old Men, Fargo or O Brother Where For Art Thou?, but there is still enough to keep you interested. The boys’ reputation is such that actors like to work for them, and they have gathered such an impressive cast that each scene appears effortless.
We are introduced to Osborne Cox (John Malkovich), an intelligence analyst at the CIA who is promptly told he is out on his ear because he drinks too much. We soon discover why. As well as having a deathly dull and shadily immoral occupation, his wife Katie (Tilda Swinton) is as friendly as a viper, and he finds solace in the bottle.
It is super stuff. We discover this Cruella De Ville character, who is having an affair with cop Harry Pfarrer (George Clooney), is a paediatrician. This vile creature tells a young patient that if he doesn’t open his mouth when she asks him to, she’ll “ask your mother to leave the room and we’ll work this out together in private”.
It is horribly threatening and very funny. Her cold-heartedness makes you feel sorry for her husband.
As Cox looks for a new direction in life, he begins to pen his memoirs. Little does he know his wife is searching his computer for financial information to pass on to her lawyer in order to prepare for a divorce.
The secretary entrusted with this disk leaves it in a gym locker room, where it is picked up by internet dater Linda (Frances McDormand).
She is desperate to raise the cash for some cosmetic procedures and when this supposedly hot CIA information turns up, she sees a chance to make money.
Clooney’s character is particularly well observed. He jogs to keep his vanity topped up and his regular comments on the quality of others’ flooring reveals much in one short sentence.
This is no Big Lebowski, but still enjoyable stuff. |
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