Hey everyone. Capone in Chicago here.

My inclination--hell, every critic's inclination--is to overanalyze every Coen Brothers film, to look at each film in the context of all their other works and judge each new offering against FARGO or THE BIG LEBOWSKI or O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU? and, now, NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. But the truth is that we don't do that for every filmmaker, only the ones we love (and a few that we deeply loathe). So here's the thing about their latest, BURN AFTER READING, is that you don't have to do that. In fact, odds are you'll like the film a whole lot better if you don't. After the nearly suffocating seriousness of NO COUNTRY, it would appear that the Brothers Coen simply wanted to blow off a little nervous laughter. To those ends, they've constructed a very silly, very funny, very short piece of complicated comedy in which the story isn't really important and precedent is given to anything that makes most of the film's characters look dopey and makes the audience laugh.

There's no need to dig too deep into the plot or the characters with BURN AFTER READING. Half the fun of watching this movie is seeing how convoluted and twisted the Coens can make the story, which involves a found disc that may or may not contain classified information; a short-tempered CIA analyst (John Malkovich) with a drinking problem and a wife (Tilda Swinton) who can't stand him and is having an affair with a federal marshal (George Clooney), who is addicted to online dating; a pair of inept fitness center employees (Frances McDormand and Brad Pitt, who find the aforementioned disc and attempt to blackmail the analyst into giving them money for it); the gym manager (Richard Jenkins), who has a fierce crush on McDormand; and how all of these lives intersect and literally smash into each other in completely unexpected ways.

The one very clear thing that BURN AFTER READING has in common with many Coen Brothers' films dating back to their debut work, Blood Simple, is that the audience is really the only participant in this process who knows and understands everything that is going on in the story. Coming in a close second (during a pair of side-splitting scenes) are J.K. Simmons and David Rasche as two higher-ranking CIA officials who go through the events of most of the movie and decide... well, they decide to wait to decide. Every word, every look, every exasperated gasp in these two scenes is hilarious. And that's in a film that made me laugh a great deal.

Brad Pitt is just trying so hard to be dense, that you don't doubt him for a second. He knows just enough spy and intelligence lingo to dig himself deeper into trouble. McDormand stuns me at every turn. She's playing a middle-aged woman who truly believes she only has a couple good years left in her current body and she needs several elective, cosmetic surgeries to really turn her life around. Then she meets Clooney's marauding womanizer (married, of course, to a saint of a woman who writes a series of popular children's books). For those hoping for some sort of OCEAN'S 14 reunion film, guess again. These two have one scene together, and they don't exactly talk as it plays out. The Coens never let the dust settle; things are always happening and people never stop to take a breath, let alone consider the events that have just happened or the potential consequences of what they're about to do. I can't forget the ice queen herself, Tilda Swinton, who doesn't so much take part in a relationship (either with her husband or her boyfriend) as she commandeers it. Swinton is a master at her craft, and I love her enough to marry her despite all of the whips and chains that would likely come with the package.

As funny as BURN AFTER READING can get, it's also a fairly disposable work from the Coens. It's a confection, a highly satisfying snack that keeps you until your next substantial meal. It will not go down in the pantheon of great works from these two great filmmakers, but it won't be easily discarded either. Don't read too much into it as you watch, but don't talk through it. There's something behind those blank, vacant eyes; not much, but something. I got a kick out of watching this movie, and I'm willing to bet you will as well.

-- Capone
capone@aintitcoolmail.com