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Burn After Reading (2008)

Director: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Time Out rating

Average user rating

89 reviews

Synopsis

The Coens return to a lighter, glossier vein with this comedy drama about a missing CIA memoir. George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Tilda Swinton star.

Movie review

From Time Out London

With their hangdog mugs now nestled against the bosom of mainstream Hollywood, indie-crossover darlings the Coen brothers have concocted another of their Hawkesian screwball quickies in which an ensemble of beautiful A-listers merrily play the fool. Already a hit in the US, ‘Burn After Reading’ is a snappy, confident, lightly satirical and stridently mischievous entertainment that arrives on the back of their sand-blasted lament for times past, ‘No Country for Old Men’.

But while the tenor may have changed, the madcap template is very much in place. The rub: a disc containing the memoirs of recently dismissed, mid-level CIA operative Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich at his high-falutin, foul-mouthed best) floats into the hands of two gormless gym employees-turned-recreational grifters, plastic surgery-obsessed singleton Linda (Frances McDormand) and soft liberal airhead Chad (Brad Pitt, right). After an inevitably calamitous attempt at bribery (‘We’ve got your secret shit!’), the pair find themselves cack-handedly doorstepping the Russian embassy in search of a swifter pay-off. Fold into that a parallel story where George Clooney’s rubber-faced philanderer, Harry, tries to juggle semi-serious flings with Linda and Osbourne’s flamed-haired ex, Katie (Tilda Swinton).

Considering the Coens’ past form with intricately plotted farces (‘Raising Arizona’, ‘Fargo’, ‘The Big Lebowski’), this does feel effortless to the point that you might imagine they could have scribbled it on the back of a napkin between breakfast and brunch. Yet, beneath its deadpan façade, nimble direction and robust photography (care of Emmanuel Lubezki) lies a cheerily nihilistic (misanthropic even?) work which paints its characters as preening, self-obsessed, idiot savants who wear stupid clothes, habitually lie, misuse the internet for dating and wouldn’t know a conscience from a Coke bottle. Even at their lowest ebb (2004’s ‘The Ladykillers’) the brothers’ palpable affection for old movies injected some humanity into the overly sardonic proceedings; but here, even the movies are bad, as seen in their snarkily anodyne film-within-a-film, ‘Coming Up Daisy’.

The audience are, in the end, placed in the boots of JK Simmons’s flummoxed CIA chief who, having been nervously informed of the preceding antics, finds it tough to fathom how these people could have been so damn stupid. It’s possibly the Coens’ least romantic film, which makes the cynical tone a tough pill to swallow, but chances are that you’ll be too busy hooting and chuckling idiotically to notice.

Author: David Jenkins 2008-10-14 11:38:51

Time Out London Issue 1991, Oct 16 – 22, 2008

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User reviews of this film

Tuskan360 said...

Posted on Oct 30 2009 19:33 Worst film I've ever watched, there was no plot line to speak of, it just never went anywhere. There were no real jokes, just lots of swearing for no good reason.

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Anthony said...

Posted on Jul 23 2009 04:10 This is the worst film I have ever seen. I didn't realise it was a comedy until I came online disappointed to see what the reviews said. I didn't laugh once, I didn't even come close to raising a smile. I thought it was going to be some kind on intelligent slow burner but I was wrong. I'm actually annoyed this film stole 95 minutes of my life. Were such lines as 'We've got your secret shit' and mistaking 'drivel' for 'dribble' supposed to be funny? Absolutely pathetic.

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Paul C said...

Posted on Apr 12 2009 16:41 Excellent film. Very clever script.

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wilko said...

Posted on Mar 16 2009 13:35 John we're all different, you cn't defend a film by saying people don't understand the Coen Bros humour. It might just be the case that this wasn't very good. I've never got French and Saunders but it's not because I don't get their humour. It's because they're shite.I thought it was OK effortless, not a Fargo or Lebowski but OK

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miles said...

Posted on Dec 09 2008 16:23 this represents everything that has gone wrong with hollywood -a real pity

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Geezer said...

Posted on Dec 06 2008 23:30 The Coen's worst since Crimewave. Indulgent and unfunny, it sneers at all its characters, and the audience for watching in the hope of being entertained. It also makes their other comedies seem worse in retrospect, as their quirky humour now seems more like arrogance than it did before. The ending is basically the Coens admitting they have no ending, and no, they don't care.

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mockingbird said...

Posted on Nov 27 2008 10:14 One star for the last 20 minutes,would have been none but I just managed to stay awake.I got the idea that this film was made with the aim of showing us how clever the director was rather than attempting to entertain the audience.

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mcleod said...

Posted on Nov 22 2008 21:30 A complete and utter dissapointment. I went with a friend, and we almost fell asleep during this film. With the cast involved, this should be one of the best films i have ever seen- but its probably the worst. Ridiculous plot, poor show from al the actors- Malkovich i am ASHAMED. I was bored almost to tears watching this film. This really is not worth the money.

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Roy said...

Posted on Nov 20 2008 17:02 Malkovich is fantastic, Pitt and Clooney are very entertaining. The plot is bizzare typical of the coen brothers. This is on a par with the big leb

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marion said...

Posted on Nov 18 2008 18:51 very poor i was so bored i fell asleep,worst film i have seen with two brill actors

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Paolo said...

Posted on Nov 18 2008 10:22 I don't get the negative reviews. Sure it wasn't intellectually demanding, and the end may leave a few unanswered questions for those (myself included) who kind of like closure - BUT this was funny. Its dry humour, poking fun of the human condition, with just a hint of slapstick (Clooney's chair especially) - was just plain amusing. It's been a while since I heard the whole audience splitting its sides - but here that's what happened. Watch it and decide.

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Mr P said...

Posted on Nov 16 2008 09:19 Very weak film indeed, never got going and story doesn't flow - Poor! The A-list incumbents must be a tad embarrassed on watching the play back. And David Jenkins who wrote the Time Out review above needs to get his head from up his nether regions with his needless over complication of the English language - get over yourself fella! Off for a pint...

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Cjob said...

Posted on Nov 12 2008 18:59 If this was a film made by unknowns no-one would - or should - give it the time of day or a single star. The ending just looked like they had run out of time. There is nothing to 'get', it was a meaningless effort.

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keeks2006 said...

Posted on Nov 12 2008 17:38 this film didn't have a great store line it was just ok. i wouldn't tell my friends to go out and see it as soon as .

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Phil Ince said...

Posted on Nov 12 2008 13:31 The usual Coen Brothers bloody farce; slightly over-played and underwhelming. If you've got nothing better to do, be a bit more enterprising than seeing this film.

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