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Mr. Beaks Ponders The Inspired Foolishness Of BURN AFTER READING
SPOILER ALERT !!
(This review is riddled with spoilers or near-spoilers, so you might want to read after watching.)
Joel and Ethan Coen's BURN AFTER READING opens with what appears to be a spy satellite's view of a computer-generated Earth. I think. Perhaps it's a model. Whatever it is, it's laughably fake, which means it's a detail the Coens really want you to notice. That this artificiality is accompanied by a bombastic Carter Burwell cue seemingly swiped from John Landis's SPIES LIKE US only serves to heighten the onrushing sense of parody; and as the camera comes crashing down through the fake clouds toward a fake United States and through the fake roof of a fake building in fake Langley, Virginia to reveal real CIA desk jockeys doing really stupid shit, your only response is to put your guard down and let the Coens enjoy their spirited, if inconsequential, NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN victory lap. Visually, they've just told you they're up to nothin' but funnin', right?
This is confirmed the minute Osborne Cox (John Malkovich) unleashes a torrent of righteous indignation in response to his unceremonious removal from "the Balkans desk"; it just sounds like an outmoded, meaningless assignment - and the thorough absence of stakes is reflected in the weary demeanor of Cox's superior (David Rasche) and the slumping body language of all the other bureaucrats lounging about the sterile office. Whatever Cox did at "the Balkans desk", it was of zero consequence, thus rendering his threats to write a tell-all "memoir" pathetically empty. This is a man who has done nothing and seen less, a balled-up mass of inarticulate acrimony who wants to tear down the organization which just discarded him, but can't because he never got anywhere within it. Cox is a married, childless, friendless island of scorn; his only confidant is his invalid father who once, we're led to believe, mattered at the Agency. Were the old man capable of speech, he'd probably upbraid Cox for being a failure.
It's unclear as to what's kept Cox's ice queen wife, Katie (Tilda Swinton), hanging around, but now that her husband's fringe-of-the-Beltway career has ended, she's more than ready to throw him over for Harry Pfarrer (George Clooney), a former Secret Service agent who compensates for having never fired his sidearm in the line of duty by firing his other weapon as often as possible. It's curious that Katie is willing to share her home with an unrepentant philanderer, but Harry's pathological infidelity frees her of feigning any emotional attachment (this chilliness extends to Katie's medical practice; she's a pediatrician who hates kids). And it's a brilliant arrangement for Harry, even though he has yet to break the news to his wife, an author of children's books who's currently touring the country in support of her latest work (and having an affair of her own).
And then there's the biggest nobody of all, Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand), a fortysomething gym employee who's heartbroken that her company's health insurance won't pay for the elective liposuction and breast enhancement procedures that might make her a marginally more attractive (and happier) woman. It's a hopeless situation until her co-worker Chad (Brad Pitt) stumbles across a computer disc containing what he believes to be "raw intelligence"; it's the kind of highly sensitive information someone might pay top dollar to retrieve. All they have to do is contact the owner and shake him down for a tidy five-figure payday. Little do they know that the unfinished memoirs of Osborne Cox are worth less than the disc to which they've been contemptuously committed.
The Coens' touch is so light in the early going (despite Burwell's deathly serious score, which sounds like a series of unused cues for NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN), that it's a bit shocking when the blood begins to flow and the bodies start to pile up. That said, one's startled reaction to the first serious act of violence in the film is not a gasp, but a big ol' belly laugh. It's the only possible reaction given the string of idiotic presumptions that have brought the suddenly deceased to the bedroom of Osborne Cox. And to think it all began with one man's bilious assault on an establishment which barely knew he existed. But there can't be anything to the idea of impotent rage producing the premature discharging of a firearm by a nymphomaniac who's never shot another human being in the line of duty, can there? Of course not! There's nothing to take away from this. It's all just a frivolity concocted by two filmmakers who've made a career out of frustrating critical deconstruction.
Not so fast. When the great J.K. Simmons, as an upper-mid-level intelligence type (we know he's someone because his hallway is carpeted), slams the book shut on all that's transpired over the ninety minutes, claiming that nothing happened and that all we've learned is to never do it again, you've no choice but to conclude that there's some misdirection afoot. And, upon further review, there really is. Whereas most Coen noirs are more firmly rooted in the works of Hammett (MILLER'S CROSSING), Chandler (THE BIG LEBOWSKI) and Cain (THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE), the low-level shenanigans of BURN AFTER READING play like a D.C.-bound goof on the spy fiction of John le Carré; except, instead of being bound to lifeless, unfeeling nations, these scurrying fools are beholden to instant gratification. They want what they perceive is best for them as soon as possible, and they're willing, particularly in the case of Linda Litzke, to sacrifice the security of their country to obtain it.
It's survival of the pettiest, and it's telling that the only person who achieves their objective is the one most hellbent on their own self-interest. But then the Coens' camera retreats from fake Langley, back through the fake clouds and out into the vast expanses of fake space, and we're reminded that people just don't get away with such things in our universe. It sure is swell to live in a world where justice prevails.
Faithfully submitted,
Mr. Beaks
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+ Expand All
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Did you like it or not?
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I didn't read the review because of the spoilers. :D
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I honestly can't tell.
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Highly recommended! It works on two different levels! Fantastic!
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Seriously, Only watched it for the first time last month. I saw No Counrty For Old Men and became intrigued with the brother's Coen. As such, I am looking forward to seeing this little flick and extending my back catelogue on all stuff made be them. A little late to the table I know. But hey, better late than never, ay?
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How we've usually got a story to how we fall in love with their work. Mine starts with seeing Hudsucker Proxy in high school. Just the music, the style, the parts that seem to make sense and not make sense at the same time. Damn they're good.
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Sep 12, 2008 8:18:55 PM CDT
yeah beaks, but why is olsen here (and what does he do)
by irrelevntelefant
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To say that the Coen's are just "jerking off" sub textually is misguided to say the least. Thanks for the in depth mis en scene analysis Beaks, keep up the great work.
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*SPOILER* I took the whole thing to be a play on the idea of the "intelligence" community being anything but, which could be because of the very public bungling of intelligence gathering in the last eight years (whether the intelligence community has been scapegoated or no). I'm not grinding a political axe here, I'm just saying that with Cox going off the handle about "morons!!" left and right and his judgments being vindicated in everyone's behavior, there really is some colossal stupidity on display. Which would mean nothing in itself, but Rasche and Simmond's hilarious take on the events give both the ground-level perspective and the birds-eye view a parallel that give both new meanings. When the CIA's conclusions to everything they hear is to sweap it under the table or burn it, particularly given that they don't know what it is they're sweeping/burning, they come off as no smarter than the stupidest subject they're tailing. The final submission says it all: "So, what DID we learn here?" Nothing seems to be the answer, and given that they didn't seem particularly interested in learning anything in the first place, it's a sweeping generalization to the lowest common denominator and highest levels of government equally, and a funny one.
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Sep 12, 2008 10:03:51 PM CDT
"You thought it was a SCHWIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNN!!!!!!!!"
by nasty in the pasty
Brad Pitt is HILARIOUS in this. Too bad I had his character's fate RUINED for me by some talkback asshole on Mori's review...
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*SPOILER* I really wouldn't say justice prevails here. The characters who die are the most innocent and well-intentioned people involved, and McDormand gets paid for getting them killed. It doesn't seem that just to me.
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Of course justice doesn't prevail, hence the reason why this film is very much about the government's shadow wing, the CIA.
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The search feature on this site has down syndrome.
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Had no ID cards or credit cards. Did he go his entire life never getting them? That's a great character moment in the film right there.
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... nope. She warns him before he goes in to tear out the laundry labels and make sure he's carrying nothing on him that can ID him. It's a spare throwaway wallet, so if he got caught, he wouldn't be carrying anything that would give away who he was.
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....was one of the best reveals of the movie. Just brilliant.
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brad pitt finally playin a character he prob identifies with personally.....semi gay...
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When he said justice prevails, he didn't mean th film, he meant the real world. Read the review closely. He expresses how the film isn't part of the actual world we live or like it anywas. Enjoyed the film but found Clooney and Pitt to be just ok. J.K. Simmons and Malkovich were phenomenal.
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For some reason, it felt like Pitt and Clooney were trying to hard to play quirky. It just didn't fit.
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My favorite shit in the movie was the scenes where Pitt and Malkovich got to play off each other (should've been the main thrust of this film if you ask me). Also love the J.K. Simmons stuff. I think that too much time was spent on other characters although I do realize that literally every character has to exist in order for this plot to play out.
I guess what I'm trying to say is it was kinda off balance in terms of awesome to mediocre ratio. Not bad though. 7 out of 10. -
Sep 13, 2008 5:44:58 AM CDT
Raising Arizona and Hudsucker Proxy and Big Labowski
by theycallmemrglass
Are my favourite Coen movies. I think I prefer their screwball comedies to their quirky noir dramas but they are all brilliant and original. Out of the dramas, Miller's Crossing is their greatest. I sure as hell look forward their new movie as I have done ever since I saw Raising Arizona.
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i think i'll see it now.
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did the title for this article change name??
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as a mean-spirited, pitch-black satire of the American intelligence community, and the intelligence of American communities, it's really good. Cox was the hero of the piece, to me. This confirms that Pitt can't act, also: he's just a mess of shoulder-rolls, head-bobs, flailing arms and 'chewing'. Good flick, but not the zany comedy that the previews lead you to expect.
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I went yesterday
there was a good crowd of people there. everyone was laughing through the whole thing. especially at the murders. including me. very confusing movie : /
Except at the hatchet murder which kind of snapped me out of the laughter. wow incredibly brutal, probably one of the most brutal movie murders since that crazy shit in Goodfellas and Casino
and then I started laughing again at the conclusion scene
"so what did we learn from this, Palmer?" -
and the laughs over the "FBI are idiots" lines as well as the final resolution of the untidy little situation were pretty hearty. Probably because the crowd was full of bureaucrats who were laughing knowingly. And now every time I take a walk down by the Tidal Basin I am gonna be looking out for the fucking online dating losers sitting on the park benches!
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It was too vile when it got to those killings. I wanted more of Chad, and would love to have seen him and the Coxes stuck in a room together. But no, instead they kill him off first, and then, the only other non-asshole in the movie gets bludgeoned to death graphically at the end. What a fucked up mess. Those brutal killings were a major mistep, and focusing on the McDormand and Clooney characters was another. JK Simmons saved what was left at the end though. Him, Pitt, Swinton, and at times Malkovich were the best parts of the movie (but Malkovich's "Fuck"-out tantrums got old, woulda been nice to do something different with him by the third time). This was way way too much No Country For Old Men/The Ladykillers and not enough Raising Arizona/Oh Brother Where Art Thou for my taste.
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was right after the last death. When that happened it almost seemed like too much. This is the most decent character in the story and he gets shot... then it looks like he's gonna get away, but gets it much worse than you originally thought he would. Of course it's the Coen Brothers and of course it's exactly the point that the best people get it the worst. But in the context of this story it *almost* seemed like too much...
and then it cut to J.K. Simmons and David Rasche with confused looks on their faces, clearly in the middle of discussing what exactly went on here, and the laugh that gave me immediately overwhelmed the disgust at how bad things got. It's a great switchup and it's those kind of moments that can make a great movie. Even if this isn't really that great of a movie in my opinion it does have some touches of greatness. -
I thought the deaths were hilarious. My theater erupted with applause when J.K. Simmons tell the guy to pay for her plastic surgery. Among the best Coen brothers comedies for sure.
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Even in real life, it can be amusing to witness how such different personalities interact with each other. (Look no further than these talkbacks, here at AICN.) Funny stuff.
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