Complaining that the Coen Brothers can be a little too smart-alecky is like bitching that de Sica was excessively humanistic: more than a little obvious, and completely beside the point. They am what they am, and putting aside the proposition that there’s some moral/ethical prerogative to privilege humanism over smart-aleck-ness, how well you’ll appreciate/enjoy these filmmakers’ works depends on how readily you’re willing to key into (which doesn’t necessarily mean agree with) their perspectives. For myself, I found the Coens’ latest, Burn After Reading, to be their most perfectly constructed live-action-cartoon film since Raising Arizona. (And no, since you asked, I don’t consider the great Lebowski to be among their live-action-cartoon films. More like a takeoff on a Powell-Pressburger film on acid, among other things. I’ll get into it another time.)
I imagine you’ve already read at least a dozen or so synposes of the film’s plot, which saves me some work (ain’t blogging grand?), but I haven’t seen enough love given to the very deft way the Coens juggle a bunch of narrative balls here; for all its briskness of pace, the knotty plot of Burn reveals itself very deliberately, but without any flagging of energy. The doofus would-be blackmailers played by Brad Pitt and Frances McDormand (whose monstrous single-mindedness is both the movie’s secret weapon and punchline) don’t even turn up until almost a half-hour in. The zingers are, it seemed to me, even more plentiful and knowing than in an average Coen picture; I loved the indignance with which Malkovich’s impossibly affected kneecapped CIA guy fumes “I have a drinking problem,” and the thoroughly unimaginative stuff he drawls into his tape recorder as he improvises his “memwas”: “George Kennan, a personal hero of mine…” Ouch.
No, you don’t really “care” about any of these characters, just as you don’t really “care” about Daffy Duck. I rather doubt that the Coen brothers aren’t aware, when they do films such as these, that their characters lack depth. The caricaturing is the point. George Clooney’s compulsive stud is kind of a special treat, augmenting the dimwit Gable he essayed in O Brother, Where Art Thou? and Intolerable Cruelty with touches of Patrick Warburton’s dumbass sex toy David Puddy from Seinfeld; tell me you don’t hear it in his character’s post-coital mantra, “I should try to get in a run.” To underscore the live-action-cartoon-ness, Clooney’s climactic freakout almost explicitly recalls the meltdown suffered by Steve Brodie (“Everybody’s turning into rabbits!!”) in the 1949 Looney Tune Bowery Bugs. No, really. It does. Trust me. I’m a film critic.
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In its way, though—in its incredibly goofy, nasty, and, let’s say, smart-alecky way—Burn evokes a fallen world just as strongly as the Coen’s previous film, No Country For Old Men, did. The signs of the apocalypse are everywhere here. Among them: People who say they’re out to “reinvent” themselves, voice-activated HMO “help” lines, perky morning TV hosts, and, perhaps Dermot Mulroney (who is, in a sense, the most game of all the very game players here). And just as (possible spoiler alert here, although I don’t necessarily think so, but then, saying “why don’t you read it and decide yourself?” won’t solve the problem either, so…) the Coens showed their viewers some mercy by not showing the awful way Moss met his fate in No Country, here they cut away from the action just as it’s eddying into what would have been roiling grotesquerie, leaving two subordinate characters to provide the exposition, and, yes, do a little philosophizing. Which is much funnier than Uncle Ennis’ .
Good stuff. Check it out.
Haven’t seen the movie yet, but I had to chime in to take issue with your assertion that we as an audience don’t “care” about Daffy Duck. I’m actually having a hard time thinking of many fictional characters that I care about *more* than Daffy Duck. All that frustration, anger, dashed hopes…has their ever been a more pathos-laden catchphrase–or phrase in general–than Daffy’s exasperated “You’re…despicable!”
You could’ve picked virtually any other classic cartoon character and your analogy would’ve worked. Me, I don’t give two shits about Bugs; that son of a bitch always gets what he wants. But Daffy’s pain is so real, and so hilarious, that it’s damn near human.
That’s a valid point. Should have picked a different cartoon character. But then again, you never know whose toes you’re going to step on. When I was the sci-fi columnist at TV Guide, I got an unbelievably hurt and angry note from a Huckleberry Hound fan for the mere suggestion that the then-nascent Cartoon Network’s program tiltied a little heavily toward the affable, Daws-Butler-voiced dog. Damn.
But still. You see my point. There are different ways of caring and all…
Question: has there been a bigger belly-laugh this year in the movies than the reveal of Harry’s invention, and Linda’s reaction to it?
Daffy’s also kind of a dick, though. I mean, I love the guy, and I do sort of root for him, but if I ever actually had to spend any time with him I’d probably want to knock that beak right onto the other side of his head.
I’m no hater, I just think it’s slight. Smart-alecky is fine, but I found “Burn” to be the Coens’ most misanthropic (I think your apocalypse line is apt, but the more overt throughline to me was that it’s America’s own fault, those dumb, self-centered sheep!), and I disagree that there’s much difference between their decidedly serious films to their live-action-cartoonish works in characterization.
The reason is, I’m of the opinion that they haven’t written a single three-dimensional character in their entire careers; fully-realized cariactures maybe (the closest they’ve come to realistic is Marge Gunderson, which may have more to do with McDormand’s pathos than what’s on the page. Take another look at their best creations – The Dude, Barton Fink, Tom Reagan, Ed Crane – and then try to convince me that they’re people, not just personalities). To again invoke Seinfeld: “Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” Hell, I thought “Intolerable Cruelty” was a hoot, if also slight.
I’m looking forward to this.
Honestly, I’ve never viewed the Coens as deep artists, but rather showmen. Honestly, I have a variable relationship with their work; I can take or leave “Fargo”, “O Brother”, and especially “No Country for Editors”, but try and take my copies of “The Big Lebowski” or “Raising Arizona”, and violence will ensue.
This, I think, will cater to my desires quite nicely. 🙂
SPOILERS below.
Glenn: “No, you don’t really “care” about any of these characters.…”
Actually, I thought Jenkins’s fate was the saddest beat in any Coen brothers film since The Big Lebowski’s Donny got dragged out of the shadowy sidelines and into the bright starry lights at the heart of tragedy. His sendoff even inoculates the film from the misanthropy charge, stating the most callous interpretations of everything we’ve seen in Cox’s loathsome, superior sneer and countering them with Jenkins’s plain-spoken decency: “She’s not a moron”; “No I’m not [one of the moron league].”
And if Pitt doesn’t get so fully compassionate a death scene, his flashing that goofy, ingratiating grin before the bullet sprays his brains against the closet wall is a disorienting shocker.
I think the Coens have always been moral filmmakers, willing to laugh at our every foible but never skipping over the consequences and very real costs of our self-absorption. Burn After Reading no less just because it contains quite possibly the funniest dildo joke in movie history.
Well, that’s what we’re here for—not just agreements, but arguments. Bruce, yours are good. Aaron, yours are too, although I’m more familiar with them via face-to-face disagreements. Do keep them coming, all.
And Bruce, the more I think about it, the more I come around to your perspective re Jenkins. Which is why, I think, the Coens cut away when they do—it just gets too real.
I liked “Burn” much, much more than I expected to, but my expectations were guarded-to-low.
One thing I think is worth mentioning is that the story stays on the rails the entire time. So many other Coen joints shift into questionable and/or disorienting areas at crucial times but this one really sticks to the map.
@Harvey: Yes, that was what I was trying to convey when I talked about its deftness.
@Bruce: I think you’re on to something there. Really. I wanna see it again and let it sink in—although I already recognize what you’re talking about—but, yeah…
Oh no, I’m not condemning it/them at all! That was just a observation in the margins as I originally wrote to say that it was the film’s slightness, not its smart-aleck ‘tude, that made me Forget After Watching, as both I and Dave Fear independently arrived at. I guess I was rambling about their ever-cartoonish nature (to me, they’re basically still re-working “Crimewave,” if with higher sophistication) because this was the film that confirmed in my mind how I always felt about the Coens’ worldview (misanthropic, which I don’t think Jenkins’ fate quite counteracts since he isn’t given much development beyond “shy guy longing for gal who sees right through him”). I’m still a Coens fan, goddammit. And I love Daffy Duck, too. But this one didn’t have the rewatchability for me that most of their oeuvre has.
“Sees right through him” = not the right turn of phrase. Barely notices him? Oh, whatever. I think I’ll just watch “Happy-Go-Lucky” for the third time…
“When I was the sci-fi columnist for TV Guide…”
I demand more stories from this chapter in the life of Glenn Kenny.
Aaron: “…[Jenkins] isn’t given much development beyond “shy guy longing for gal who sees right through him””
Jenkins may deserve the bulk of the credit–his hesitation makes clear he’s unable to fool even himself–but his sad little assertion about how he’s happier having dropped his divine calling for managing a gym (talk about the ways of the flesh) filled in plenty of the blanks for me.
I don’t deny the Coens tend to deal in sharply drawn caricature rather than fully formed character, the better to get their parables across. But I find them delighting too much in the odd angles and rough edges of people–in Clooney’s sloppy munching of his bruschetta or McDormand anxiously waiting to see which of her dates will laugh at a movie–to mark them as misanthropes. Though certainly I get where the argument comes from. Just like I disagree but get where it comes from when people use it against Leigh.
@Aaron, right on on your glomming on to the “Crime Wave” continuity. What burns my gut are concern trolls—who wouldn’t know “Crime Wave” from a hole in the ground—disguising themselves as film critics and boo-hooing about the Coen’s misanthropy (I mean Dana Stevens, not Manohla Dargis, although I disagree vigorously with M.D.). And I have to say I’m a little disappointed that a critic as astute as David Fear pulled out the completly lame “this is what they do after they’ve won an Oscar?” complaint. As if the Coens should give 2/16ths of a flying fuck. Come on.
I haven’t seen the film yet, but any movie with David Rasche in it has to be worth watching. SLEDGEHAMMER NATION UNITE, YO!
I’m with Glenn in thinking this film is anything but slight, and I’d actually argue – and fully intend to argue, if I ever find a spare couple of hours in this TIFF/NYFF maelstrom – that it’s even more probing and incisive than No Country. Am I the only one who sees the whole thing as an allegory for how the Bush admin got us into Iraq?
Also, is “concern trolls” an original phrase? ‘Cause it’s so awesome. I coined “soup kitchen cinema” to describe the movies they tend to champion.
“Question: has there been a bigger belly-laugh this year in the movies than the reveal of Harry’s invention, and Linda’s reaction to it?”
How about the reveal of what Katie (Tilda Swinton) does for a living, and her use of ‘good cop/bad cop’ in a way that’s totally of a piece with the rest of the film?
@hotbodybuildersunite (hee): I care more about Wile E. Coyote than I do about Daffy Duck. Or almost anyone.
Fair enough, Glenn…frankly, the film would be a disappointment regardless of whether (a) they’d won an Oscar or not for No Country for Old Men and (b) whatever movie this happened to have followed. But I do think that, having just seen what they can do when they’re really, really on their game, the sheer WTF?-ness of Burn After Reading feels particularly galling. It’s less “this is what they do after they win an Oscar?” than the pressure drop from such heights to such lazy depths.
But hey, I’m not going to defend what I wrote; I stand by the review and the sentiments within it. Sorry you were disappointed (I’ll try harder next time) and thanks for “astute,” as opposed to “asnine,” “atrocious” or “abhorrent.” Just count yourself that you didn’t see the first draft, in which I detailed several afternoonn dalliances with hot bodybuilders.
@md’a—I wish I could take credit for “concern troll,” but alas the phrase is an already venerated Internet Tradition.
@ fear—You know I got nothin’ but love for you. Sing it with me, my friend: “There’s only you and me, and we just disagree.”
Now that the laughter is wearing off (and yes, I laughed almost all the way through this one), the film is starting to sink in.
Two of my favorite moments: Richard Jenkins’ short/sharp intake of breath after he’s just been reamed by the love of his life and Clooney slapping his belly like George C. Scott coming out of the can in Strangelove.
Following Glenn’s train of thought that this is a stylistic cousin of Raising Arizona, I think it’s also thematically related. Linda’s single-minded determination to get what she wants despite the consequences for everyone involved is reminiscent of Hi and Ed’s little baby caper. Quite the opposite really of The Dude’s desire to be left in peace to drink his white Russians, roll with the boys and have the occasional acid flashback.
I loved this movie right away, and I’m loving it even more now that it’s beginning to resonate.
I haven’t seen anyone comment yet on Carter Burwell’s score for the film– there are no comedic music cues used at all in this film; the music is tense and suspenseful, like a Tony Scott/Ridley Scott thriller. In fact, the first 20-minutes play like an ultra-serious thriller. But I wonder if the lack of formal comedic cues in the film is what has led some to not think this “comedy” is actually very funny. Aside from the dialogue and perhaps Brad Pitt’s dancing and dopey facial expressions, BURN AFTER READING plays formally like a drama.
That’s a great point Geoff. Burwell’s straight-faced score and Lubezki’s slick cinematography play like a serious espionage thriller, which makes the absurd caperings of the cast (played as though they don’t know they’re being funny) even more hilarious if you’re tuned in to it.
That’s a great thought though about why more people aren’t finding this movie more openly funny. I bet they will on repeated viewings.
Yes, Burwell’s score, which seems to take itself very seriously, is indeed excellent. A very accomplished pastiche/parody element in a film that is not wholly a pastiche or parody. One of the things I’ve always loved about the Coens’ movies is the freedom they take for granted, the refusal to let a false sense of consistency become their hobgoblin. In some sense, “Burn” is a lampoon of a spy picture, and in other senses, not that at all. “The film opens and closes with a Google Maps view of the Earth that has already become a cinematic cliché,” Dargis notes in her review. Well, yes. Exactly.
I’m just now starting to read what other people have written about it and haven’t gotten to Dargis yet. I’m still kind of bathing in the warm glow of my own enjoyment, I don’t want to start hearing the same old criticisms of the Coens.
I have to say though, when the movie ended I was thinking “well, this was great but it sure isn’t going to inspire the kinds of ruminations that kept No Country going for months,” but now I’m beginning to think I was wrong. The stuff you’ve written here and, somewhat surprisingly, Jeff Wells’ own comments have opened the film up for me.
This is going to be fun.
Hate to be a pedant, but wasn’t this shot before they won the Oscars?
Indeed it was. And a very smooth shoot it was. My Lovely Wife’s old roommate, a good friend of ours, was one of the location people, and said it was by far the most organized picture he’s ever worked on (and he’s worked on a bunch, including a “Bourne”). Done by 4 p.m. pretty much every day.
This was a terribly sad movie–and not just for Jenkins’ performance. Just because they were adultresses doesn’t mean I didn’t have sympathy for the two wives, and just because she was co-president of the League of Morons doesn’t mean I didn’t feel a sharp stab in my gut every time that McDormand mustered up a smile. I thought it was fairly deep, too, demonstrating the point where private and political paranoia meets. The fact that Linda met her dates on park benches–the anonymous meeting-place of choice for both lonely hearts and undercover agents–was a brilliant touch. Then again, I despised Syriana, Michael Clayton, and many other political/corporate espionage thrillers, so I appreciated the satire.
Just saw this today and I’m still smiling at certain parts- the way Pitt sounds when he calls Cox on the phone for the first time… the almost in-joke like way that Cox says “and wtf is Palmer doing here?” in his opening firing scene… the scenes of grand standing in dialogue in the way Swinton’s lawyer talks to her… the Princeton reunion scene! Magical stuff. I loved every moment. And with “No Country For Old Men” and now this, are the Coen brothers offically masters of the anti-climactic finale? I think so.
One more point of interest- it may be coincidental but just like “The Big Lebowski” is a comedical re-working of “Cutter’s Way”, their latest plays like a nice companion feature to Ronald Neame’s “Hopscotch”… that OTHER great spy comedy.
Since everyone in the world appears to be chiming in, I’m with Bruce Reid and Joel on the “caring” question. This may just be embarrassing, but I actually cried a little during Harry’s repentant phone call to his wife. The character is, of course, exaggerated in his self-absorption and lack of awareness, and Clooney attacks that first dinner-party scene with such smarminess that I figured he would just be a cartoon (albeit a funny one). However, the way that we slowly realize the extent of his pathological compulsions- the way his ritual mannerisms repeat themselves with eerie precision- went way beyond funny for me. I think Harry is the character who most clearly expresses the absurd but genuinely scary modern-apocalypse feeling of the film; he is so good at deceiving himself emotionally and going through his soulless routine that when something frighteningly REAL and out of the ordinary happens (e.g. someone in the closet), he explodes in fear. (You could probably say something similar about most of the supposedly “cartoony” characters.)
Of course, after that phone call, the movie (spoiler?) almost immediately dispels the sentimental illusion that made it so touching, and Clooney ends the scene whimpering in self-pity, prompting the “spy” to advise him to “grow up.” And his “WHO ARE YOU???” freakout is, indeed, quite cartoony. That’s part of what I think is neat about this movie; it really does “care” about its grotesque characters, in its way, which only makes their undeniable grotesquerie more powerful and funny.
Good point Geoff, I noticed that too. After Pitt died, I could sense a serious shift in the audience’s reaction to the movie, as his goofy characterization was the only thing really grounding the film as a comedy in most of the viewers’ minds. It felt like the audience was collectively thinking “wait, the funny guy is gone…what now?” Interestingly, the two scenes with J.K. Simmons as the CIA boss got huge laughs.
If Burn was a conventional (non-Coen) film, the McDormand and Jenkins characters would obviously get together. “Why, the right man for me has been under my imperfect nose all along!” Thank goodness the Coens are perhaps America’s least sentimental filmmakers ever, disregarding the ending of RAISING ARIZONA, of course.
Their enemies accuse the Coens of nihilism, but they are simply satirizing nihilism. Reviewers have called Cox’s disk a McGuffin because it doesn’t mean anything, but its meaning is its lack of meaning. The world of idiot presidents, idiot presidential candidates, a collapsing economy, hurricanes, and the unreliability of closers is absurd. The Coens address this absurdity by disguising their seriousness as comedy.
Excellent commentary on this movie Glenn. The Boston Globe’s reviewer basically made the “too smart-alecky” point, but I was going to see the movie no matter what, and I really enjoyed it. I love your frame that this is best viewed as cartoon. My wife hates the darker Coen movies, but loved this one from start to finish.
HBU: The audience reacted that way for the same reason they did when a nearly identical incident occurred in BARTON FINK: the shift in tone is simply too jarring for most people to accept without becoming upset.