Burn After Reading

When a disc filled with some of the CIA's most irrelevant secrets gets in the hands of two determined, but dim-witted, gym exployees, the two are intent on exploiting their find. But since blackmail is a trade better left to the experts, events soon spiral out of everyone's and anyone's control, resulting in a nonstop series of hilarious encounters.

After the dark brilliance of emNo Country for Old Men/em, emBurn After Reading/em may seem like a trifle, but few filmmakers elevate the trivial to art quite like Joel and Ethan Coen. Inspired by Stansfield Turner's emBurn Before Reading/em, the comically convoluted plot clicks into gear when the CIA gives analyst Osborne Cox (John Malkovich) the boot. Little does Cox know his wife, Katie (Tilda Swinton, riffing on her emMichael Clayton/em character), is seeing married federal marshal Harry (George Clooney, Swinton's Clayton co-star, playing off his emSyriana /emrole). To get back at the Agency, Cox works on his memoirs. Through a twist of fate, fitness club workers Linda (Frances McDormand) and Chad (Brad Pitt in a pompadour that recalls Johnny Suede) find the disc and try to wrangle a "Samaratin tax" out of the surly alcoholic. An avid Internet dater, Linda plans to use the money for plastic surgery, oblivious that her manager, Ted (emThe Visitor's/em Richard Jenkins), likes her just the way she is. Though it sounds like a Beltway remake of emThe Big Lebowski/em, the Coen entry it most closely resembles, this time the brothers concentrate their energies on the myriad insecurities endemic to the mid-life crisis--with the exception of Chad, who's too dense to share such concerns, leading to the funniest performance of Pitt's career. If emLebowski /emrepresented the Coen's unique approach to film noir, Burn sees them putting their irresistibly absurdist stamp on paranoid thrillers from emEnemy of the State/em to emThe Bourne Identity./em --emKathleen C. Fennessy/em br /br /br / span class="h1"strongStills from emBurn After Reading/em (Click for larger image)/strong/span table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="4" width="100%" p/p p/p tbody tr align="center" valign="top" tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn1_S.jpg" / br //td p/p tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn2_S.jpg" / br //td tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn3_S.jpg" / br //td p/p /tr tr align="center" valign="top" tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn4_S.jpg" /br //td p/p tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn5_S.jpg" /br //td tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn6_S.jpg" /br //td br / p/p /tr tr align="center" valign="top" tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn7_S.jpg" /br //td p/p td img align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn8_S.jpg" /br //td tdimg align="left" border="0" src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/dvd/Universal/BurnAfterReading/Burn9_S.jpg" /br //td /tr /tbody /table p/p