As expected, the Coens' film CIA comedy 'Burn After Reading' starring B. Pitt & G. Clooney, which was not going to be ready in time for Cannes, did a great deal of crowd applauses, a very warm welcome to the stars on the red carpet for the opening film ceremony night at Venice Film Festival. It's a really funny tale about an ousted CIA official named COX (played with great talent by Malkovich) whose memoir accidentally falls into the hands of 2 gym employees who intent on exploiting their unusual find. The Film opens with scenes at nothgelse than the HQ of the CIA in Arlington, where analyst O. Cox is fired! He arrives for what is supposed to be a top-secret meeting. Unfortunately for Cox, the secret is soon out: he is being outsted. He does not take it particularly well! Who would! and he returns to his Georgetown home to face...who?his wife! As a new life he chooses the writer side, his own side of the story of the CIA -his memoirs - and focus on his drinking-, not necessarily in that order. His wife Katie is dismayed, though not particularly surprised; she is herself already very busy into an illicit affair with,...Harry Pfarrer (Clooney), who is already married, a federal marshal, who never forget to bring humor where he goes and remind his wife and friends when socialising that he never killed anyone nor used his gun! ... and Cox's wive sets about making plans to leave Cox for Harry!!! a real fun 'farce' in the genre comedia dell'arte on the big screen!!! Harry is busy too thanks to internet dating... Malkovich acting is excellent... So, the story goes on... Elsewhere in the Washington D.C. suburbs, and seemingly worlds apart, ordinary people too are dating! we discover the world of Hardbodies Fitness Centers and his employee Linda Litzke who can barely concentrate on her work... She is consumed with finding the partner! so she is convinced that her life is now set for a plan for extensive cosmetic surgery, and confides her mission to can-do colleague Chad Feldheimer (Brad Pitt). Linda 's acting (Macdormand) is great! In the story she is all but oblivious to the fact that the gym's manager Ted Treffon fancy her even as she arranges numerous dates via the Internet with other men. The fun comes mostly also because this Ted confesses her he was previously a priest (orthodox) ie a serious guy with a conscious, then quited as bored and feels so much better in his new life as the Gym centre manager !!! He definitely fancy her -very shy-... with no doubts but she doesn't, is too busy dating on internet and here comes Harry she finds on her date site -[so there she meets by chance the to-be killer of her best friend chad [killed by accident!!! as chad came to be where he shouldn't have been!]... So at this point, we come back at the begining of the film we discover the daily life of the gym centre when... when?... when a CD containing CIA secret material . Here the analyst's memoirs accidentally falls into the hands of Linda and Chad... the duo of then 'rebels-to-be' are under a choc! is it really a CIA secret content?... Chad (B. Pitt) makes enquiries via a hacker and finds out what it is: top secret material!!! They soon intent on exploiting their find. As Ted frets, "No good can come of this," events spiral out of everyone's and anyone's control, in a cascading series of funny encounters and surprising events... It's sometimes very fresh and funny, a real gag-stupid fun! ... But it happens that by chance all gets so intricated as in a mess that all the situation ends up to be a real farce!...The weel chosen cast emphasize a good chemistry between Malkovitch and its blackmail oponent McDormand and interacting with the main cast ( but who is the villain?That's the fun of it all! ).Malkovich as usual brings a great deal of intense suspens and also a great classic aspect to the film where acting and comic fits eachone as a glove on the hand! with mastership!... There are many funny situations where you have the feel of the gags from old time classics. The cinematography is perfect, so is the music for the film... As a whole there is nothing to say, as with no doubt it's well made! so is the story good! - that is definitely a story you could read in the news nowadays ...we often hear how an official has lost his secret files more and more. The gags bring a lot of humor ... specially in a time of economic crisis! it comes well when the time is such as a recession. We wonder if this story/film makes us question the concept of 'secret' and 'exraordinary' versus 'ordinary', of truth versus lies, USA versus Russia, freedom versus oppression, cold war versus hackers war, as if there is now a reality where spies are real and just here top secret services invading an ordinary people world?... all of a sudden! But what is the lie? the reality? ... Russians?CIA?secrets lost? in a gym centre?...all is possible in this wonderfully tailor-made Great Classic Film in its own modern modest way. ©2008.JR/HDTVNEWS.nov14
Loading...
i don't really understand the movie.. but burn after reading is hilarious, because brad and george are the star!..
kaecee15 2 years ago