Frances McDormand, George Clooney, Brad Pitt

A disk containing the memoirs of a CIA agent ends up in the hands of two unscrupulous gym employees who attempt to benefit from the discovery. And a paranoid married man who is having an affair with ...( read more  read more... )the CIA agent's wife and the one gym employee becomes inadvertently involved.

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64% liked it

66,754 ratings

Critics

77% liked it

212 critics

R, 1 hr. 37 min.

Directed by: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Release Date: August 27, 2008

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DVD Release Date: December 21, 2008

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Flixster Reviews (20,051)


  • November 7, 2009
    "Oh my fuck... I just killed a fucking spook!"

    One thing about the Coen brothers - you never know what to expect when you sit down to watch one of their films. This is especially true of their comedies, which can range from lowbrow slapstick (Raising Arizona, O ...( read more)Brother, Where Art Thou?) to chilly, intellectual aloofness (The Man Who Wasn't There). As for their latest, Burn After Reading, I just watched it twice and I still don't know what to make of it. It's an intense political thriller filled with intrigue, except that there aren't any politics and the intrigue all stems from a complex web of misunderstanding, paranoia, and just plain stupidity. It's like a Bourne film in which Matt Damon has been replaced with the Three Stooges.

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    John Malkovich plays Osbourne Cox, a low-level CIA analyst who quits in a huff after being demoted due to a drinking problem, and then sets about writing his memoirs, which somehow end up in the hands of Linda (Frances McDormand) and Chad (Brad Pitt), a pair in which unextraordinarity abounds and who work at a health club. Certain that they've stumbled onto some vital classified information, Linda and Chad attempt to blackmail Cox so that Linda can finally afford a series of cosmetic surgeries that will improve her social life. When Cox refuses to pay, they take the floppy disc to the Russian embassy, where a bemused official named Krapotkin doesn't know what to make of it or them.

    Meanwhile, Cox's ice-cold wife Katie (Tilda Swinton) is having an affair with their health-nut friend Harry (George Clooney), a sex addict who has also hooked up with Linda through a computer dating service. Katie's planning to divorce Osbourne and marry Harry, while Harry still loves his wife (who's planning to divorce him and is having him shadowed by a detective) and also is falling for Linda. When Linda sends Chad to Osbourne's house to try and dig up more secret information, he runs into Harry, who thinks he's a spy. The increasingly paranoid Harry then discovers that Linda's involved in the whole thing and thinks she's a spy, too. An important element in all this is that Harry's job requires him to carry a gun, which isn't a good idea under the circumstances.

    It's a hard story to put into a nutshell, and it's even harder to convey just how goofy and off-the-wall this film is. All the trappings of the political potboiler are here - car chases, shootings, break-ins, deceptions, people being followed by shadowy figures, the whole bunch - but while one half of the cast is made up of serious people living their lives in the really real world, the other half is composed of colossal idiots blundering their way into this serious milieu and gumming up the works with catastrophic results.

    The Coens direct it like a straight-faced thriller with the chameleon-like Carter Burwell supplying a pulse-pounding musical score, and their deadpan approach to this material makes it delightfully fun to watch. It's also wonderfully unpredictable - I dare anyone to try and figure out what's going to happen next at any point in the story - with one or two developments that are wild enough to give the viewer whiplash. Like Janet Leigh's fatal shower in Psicho or the jaw-dropping ending of To Live and Die in L.A., this story often manages to whip the rug right out from under us with prankish glee.

    Frances McDormand gives us another quirky, memorable Coen character here, but unlike Fargo's Marge Gundersen, her Linda Litzke is a ditzy wacko. Brad Pitt has a great time playing the equally idiotic Chad, and together they make quite a pair. George Clooney is hilarious as the increasingly frazzled Harry, whose life is flying to pieces around him for reasons he can't even begin to understand. Malkovich, of course, is fascinating to watch as the equally paranoid Osbourne Cox, as he tries to figure out who the hell Linda and Chad are and what insidious government conspiracy is closing in around him.

    As his wife Katie, Tilda Swinton is about as cold and ruthless a bitch as you could imagine. Another Coen regular, Richard Jenkins, expertly underplays his part as usual and is probably the film's most sympathetic character. In lesser roles, David Rasche and J.K. Simmons are pitch-perfect as a couple of bland, weary CIA officials struggling to make sense of the whole twisted affair - their final scene together is a subtle, deftly-played wrap-up that had me howling in giddy disbelief as the closing credits appeared, aghast that the Coen brothers had pulled off something so audaciously messed up.

    In the end, Burn After Reading won't appeal to everyone, which is something Joel and Ethan Coen have never seemed overly concerned about. They appear content to make whatever kind of film strikes their fancy at the time and let it find whatever audience happens to latch onto it. I've always liked filmmakers who work like that, and I'm glad I latched onto this one, because not only did I have a grand time watching it, but the characters have been running around inside my head all day re-enacting scenes from the film, and I kinda like it.
  • October 30, 2009
    The cast and acting is superb; no complaints there. But the story and overall delivery was weak and not even enjoyable enough to keep me interested. I just kept waiting for this thing to end, which is a Halley's Comet-type rarity for me in a Coen Brothers' movie. A huge disappoin...( read more)tment.
  • October 8, 2009
    Over cast and expected a lot more because of the people involved. Yeah its clever but its also way up its own arsehole
  • September 3, 2009
    Its not up to the usual standards but i did like this Coen brothers film. The acting was very good (esp John Malkovich) apart from Brad Pitt. I really didn't like him in this at all and was quite glad when, what happened, happened! Funny one this, I'm not sure if the story was ma...( read more)de up as they went along but as much as i found the ending funny, it did also feel like a lazy afterthought. Its the Coen brothers though, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt!
  • August 28, 2009
    Not quite as good as I expected and certainly not one of The Coen Brothers best, but a worthy watch.

    The complicated factors of the storyline and intertwining tales make this, along with subtle humour and strong characters too.

    The all star cast did seem a little overkill a...( read more)t times and Brad Pitt?s character ranged from funny to over the top annoying.
  • November 7, 2009
    It's got so much energy, plot twists and endearing, hilarious characters that I was hooked on the film from frame #1. It practically jumps out of the screen. Brad Pitt m...(read more) akes the best impression of the AWESOME ensemble cast in his funniest role to date. The critics ...( read more)may praise the Coen's for their "deep" work like No Country for Old Men (which I find overrated personally, maybe because I don't really 'get it') but I prefer this screwball comedy...so much fun.
  • November 7, 2009
    This movie is Joel Coen and Ethan Coen's darkly humorous follow-up to their Oscar-winning masterpiece, No Country for Old Men, a grimly serious work that took little time out for comic relief. Burn After Reading certainly adheres to the customary Co...( read more)en Brothers formula where a heightened quirkiness and a deliberately disjointed storyline are coupled with sudden flare-ups of violence and the unexpected deaths of major characters. While the refusal to follow a predictable narrative path is one of the chief selling points of any Coen Brothers movie, the fact of the matter is that, in the case of Burn After Reading, the script probably could have used a few more revisions to bring the disparate elements more satisfactorily in line with one another. Too often it feels as if the movie itself is rambling around pointlessly, without any clear direction or purpose. The best thing about Burn After Reading is the delicious performances from a cast that any director would give his eyeteeth to work with. John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, Goerge Clooney and Tilda Swinton all manage to define their characters through individualized quirks without ever going over the top and reducing their characters to caricatures. But it is Brad Pitt who steals every scene he's in as the nerdy, hyper kinetic doofus who fancies himself a double-naught spy fit to stand alongside the James Bond of the world. Brad Pitt has rarely been this winning. This movie is a frequently hilarious movie that is vastly preferable to all those cookie-cutter comedies that can be found habitually ensconced in the neighborhood multiplexes.
  • November 6, 2009
    Mi fa ridere quando sento descrivere questo film come "senza senso"
    Ma senza senso una cippa, sono i fratelli Coen!
    Comunque Brad Pitt ha superato se stesso.
    Brad se stai leggendo (sicuro), ti voglio bene.
  • November 3, 2009
    I heard it's good, eh.
  • October 31, 2009
    I was like "????"
    Many questions. The sinopsis said that it's a comedy movie. I thought i couldn't find any jokes in it. It was boringing me.
    Brad Pitt here, not funny at all. Ashamed.

Critic Reviews


October 17, 2008
Nigel Andrews, The Financial Times

But wait. Didn't screwball farce go out 70 years ago? Around the time of Harry Cohn? Aren't we watching necromancy in action? Yes, yes and yes. full review

September 12, 2008
Pete Hammond, Hollywood.com

The Coens have done it again. Insanely funny. full review

September 12, 2008
Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal

Burn After Reading could just as well have been called Forget After Seeing. full review

September 12, 2008
Claudia Puig, USA Today

The brisk pace and sharp humor in Burn After Reading is a welcome relief after weeks of witless comedies and overblown action flicks. full review

September 12, 2008
Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle

Burn After Reading is neither an instant classic like No Country for Old Men nor a psychedelic playground like The Big Lebowski. But it is a Coen brothers kick in the pants. full review

September 12, 2008
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

It's funny, sometimes delightful, sometimes a little sad, with dialogue that sounds perfectly logical until you listen a little more carefully and realize all of these people are mad. full review

September 11, 2008
Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer

A goofy screwball romp that affords a gaggle of A-listers the chance to hambone around in antic style. full review

September 11, 2008
Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

It would be no country for movie lovers without the Coens. They still manage to run unmuzzled while the rest of Hollywood runs scared. full review

September 10, 2008
Armond White, The New York Press

Lesser artists would have followed a critical smash like No Country with another noir, courting audience favor through familiarity. But Burn After Reading, though shocking, is simply the flipside of t... full review

September 10, 2008
David Edelstein, New York Magazine

Burn After Reading is untranscendent, a little tired, the first Coen brothers picture on autopilot. In the words of the CIA superior, it's 'no biggie.' full review

View more Burn After Reading reviews at RottenTomatoes.com

Comments


  • OperaAngel
    January 25, 2009
    REALLY disturbing, not funny at all, except for the car chase scene but that was it.
  • chrismid259
    September 23, 2008
    It's different, I like it.
  • raulpole830
    September 19, 2008
    So would any body recommend this movie or they would just let everybody deal with it!!
  • mrbicklethepickle
    September 4, 2008
    I'm not that big on Brad Pitt but this movie looks really interesting and funny!
  • Claudia483
    May 17, 2008
    WWWAAAAHHHH WHATS TAKING THIS MOVIE SO LONG TO COME OUT!

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Burn After Reading Trivia


  • The new Coen brother's film 'Burn After Reading' (2008) has both Joel and Ethan as co-directors and writers again.  Answer »
  • Who directed BURN AFTER READING (2008)?  Answer »
  • What movie stars George Clooney, Brad Pitt,Francis McDormand, Tilda Swinton, and John Malkovich?  Answer »
  • Who plays 'Linda' in Burn After reading'?  Answer »

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