Movie Review: Burn After Reading

When a movie opens with Google Earth and a cross between percussion beats and gunshots, one has a feeling the opening scene will be in Russia, possibly in the KGB. Well, the movie opens at a rather different locale, and has dialogue in English...a bit of a disappointment for the fanciful who expected guttural Russian. It is some time into the film that one gets it is a spoof on the CIA. At least, my excuse is that I didn't know the tagline was 'Intelligence is Relative' - a rather ironic coincidence, in the light of my revelation.

The Coen brothers' latest release is a comedy of errors of intelligence, in every sense. It is also a sardonic peek at what effect movies about cool agents blackmailing each other, and dramatisations of the Deep Throat Watergate interactions could have on the layman's aspirations. The movie does a good job of satirising the lure of cosmetic surgery, FBI sunglasses, the gun culture, internet dating, detective agencies, vulture-like divorce lawyers, conjugal pretensions and techno-incompetence. The irony of timing, of mistaken identities and the reality of being as paranoid as we have been since the turn of the millennium make for interesting subtexts.

John Malkovich does a non-hammed version of Jack Nicholson in One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest. He carries off Osbourne Cox's character pretty well. Tilda Swinton is not just tight-assed, but tight-arsed as the very British Mrs. Cox, while George Clooney's ADHD-ridden Harry Pfarrer is quite a show. After his last trippy appearance as Daniel Ocean, Clooney has brought a whole new set of characteristics into the former treasury agent he plays. A few minutes of watching him look around and try to make conversation with five different people on about twenty different topics had me craving a midnight snack.

Now, Brad Pitt, though...I'd like to get my claws into him, and that does not indicate carnal inclinations of any sort. I do rate him as an actor, but perhaps it is his duties as the co-founder of a domestic United Nations that has kept him too busy to sharpen his character in this movie. But Chad the Gym Guy is a lesson in hamming. Saying "shit" a million times and chewing gum all the time could work well with intentional hamming, but with a couple of scenes where the Brad Pitt of 'Snatch' and 'Meeting Joe Black' seems to temporarily revisit the body he abandoned a while ago, he seems rather lost in transition.

Academy Award-winner Frances McDermond steals the show. As the quintessential single woman with an unattractive face, unattractive body, unattractive dress sense and unattractive job, Linda Litzke proves to be a tough cookie, and is possibly the only one in the movie who gets what she wants in the end. McDermond's ability to cast herself aside and take on absolutely any character without concern for her image, at a time when the most ordinary people want to avoid compromising on their looks, if nothing else, ensures the character comes alive.

The casting, with the possible exception of Brad Pitt (even Ashton Kutcher might have done a better job), is quite perfect. The smaller characters, such as Elizabeth Marvel's Sandy Pfarrer, and Richard Jenkins' Ted Traffon, are quite convincing. Ted Traffon as the quiet gym manager with a secret crush on Linda Litzke, which he tries his best to reveal to her but chooses the worst times, is the perfect candidate to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The music in the film does a smooth transition from pop to rock to country, and the beats are addictive. The closing song, 'CIA Man' is quite a trip, and my favourite couplet is 'Who can take sugar from a sack, put it in his tea and put it back, Fuckin' A Man, CIA Man'.

Watch if: you like spoofs, want a good laugh, are intrigued at how plastic surgery and internet dating could screw the brains of the CIA, are into music, like blitzy films, find blank expressions funny, are curious about George Clooney's contraption (no euphemisms here, he actually invents something.)

Do Not Watch if: you are a fan of Brad Pitt, are from the CIA and don't find this sort of thing funny, do not like spoofs, find swearing offensive, find dildos offensive.