Product Description

J.K. Simmons, Brad Pitt, John Malkovich, George Clooney, Tilda SwintonDirectors: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #4662 in DVD
• Brand: Blu-ray Comedy
• Released on: 2009-02-09
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .26 pounds
• Running time: 96 minutes

Synopsis
The Coen Brothers re-team with George Clooney for this blackly comic film set in the world of a former spy. John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, Brad Pitt, and Tilda Swinton are along for the sure-to-be wild ride filled with the Coens' trademark humour. With their overtly comedic follow-up BURN AFTER READING, the Coen Brothers return from the dark, dank recesses of the human psyche they traversed in their Oscar-winning NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. For those unfamiliar with the landscape of modern movie psychoanalysis, this puts the fraternal filmmakers square in the cruel, misanthropic, and farcical realm of their 1990s-era body of work, somewhere between the tragicomic crime thriller of FARGO and the disconnected noir-homage anti-storytelling of THE BIG LEBOWSKI, with 2007's NO COUNTRY retroactively adding new nihilism-tinged dimensions of smart scepticism to the proceedings. In a more linear trajectory, BURN AFTER READING also stands as the third entry, after BLOOD SIMPLE and FARGO, in what could be an unofficial Tragedy of Human Idiocy trilogy, wherein characters make the most outlandishly moronic moves to devastating consequences simply by adhering to true human behaviour. Indeed, Carter Burwell's emotionally weighty score, which washes over biting scenes of explosive, anesthetizing belly laughs, is very reminiscent of his FARGO work. BURN AFTER READING is ostensibly structured and propelled by a spy-thriller plotline involving a classified CD lost by a disgraced CIA spook and found by two simple gym employees. The CIA superior who learns of the film's events (always second-hand and sometimes along with the viewer) doesn't know what to make of it, and why would he? This is the first Coen film in almost 20 years not shot by cinematographer Roger Deakins, yet the ‘new’ guy, Emmanuel Lubezki (CHILDREN OF MEN), has created as visceral and emotionally fraught a high-definition cartoon as any since BARTON FINK.

Customer Reviews

Disappointing, but based on high expectations
The cast and the Coens returning to focus on comedy had me hoping for great things. The truth turned out to be that "Burn After Reading" is an OK film. The acting performances are, of course, mainly excellent, with John Malkovich standing out. Without him this film would have been loitering closer to the 1 star basement, I am sure.

It might be harsh to judge people by very high standards which they themselves set, but I found the plot surprisingly simple compared to previous efforts of the Coens. There are also, sadly, very few laugh out loud moments, this film's staple is the merely amusing, but it deals in that quite sparingly at times. Tilda Swinton with her lawyer and John Malkovich with his superiors provide most of the funniest scenes, but even these are, at best, moderately funny.

George Clooney does his job well enough, a fairly undemanding role until quite late on when he shines somewhat in the descent into panic and paranoia. But Brad Pitt, whose talent I admire very much, was wasted in this film. He is given far too much duff dialogue with which even he cannot do anything special. I don't think I am misunderstanding anything here: I mean that his dialogue is a duff and often tedious attempt to characterise someone as a thicko.

Reading all this you migh think 3 stars sounds like too much. But John Malkovich is very good under the terrible circumstances, and I thought that Frances MacDormand was very entertaining at times, even if her dialogue left most of the burden of decent characterisation squarely on her shoulders.

To modify Samuel Johnson's quip: worth seeing (only just) not worth buying to see. And the title "Burn After Reading" makes the cheap joke about what those unlucky enough to have paid fifteen pounds for it might do with it inevitable. Amazon's pre-release slogan was "Keep after watching", I am not so sure.....

Coen Brothers on the mark again.
A great film. Not their best but up there with, say, Fargo.
I disagree with the rude remark made by another reviewer about Bradd Pitt. I have a funny feeling that this film confused that reviewer. In a review that reflects a modern understanding of financial peril, it would seem unlikely that this remarkable commentary of modern BIG-BROTHER (not the C4 headache, try Orwell) espionage (tinged with farce) would pass the reviewer by. But clearly it did. The best news from that is that the less people understand it or like it, the cheaper it will be for cinephiles!
Enjoy. Brad Pitt is, yet again, in his element.

misses its mark
Given the star cast and the hype one could have been fooled into thinking this was a comedy, unfortuneatly it 'misses its mark'. There are a few amusing moments with each of the stars giving creditable performances and yes there is a definite political point being made in the plot but overall it was a forgetable film certainly not 'sidesplittingly funny' as described on the box. Sorry but this film will not be finding a place on my DVD shelf! Rent rather than buy is my advice.