Karnataka

Nothing much to take home

Burn After Reading (English)

Cast: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Tilda Swinton, Frances McDormand, John Malkovich

Director: Joel and Ethan Coen

Joel and Ethan Coen have developed quite a reputation in chiselling plots around oddballs. They find fun in situations which we otherwise deem serious. They do it again here with their trademark audacity.

Misjudgement turns ordinary situations into extraordinary as two goofy gym instructors (Brad Pitt and Frances McDormand) accidentally find a CD containing the memoirs of a CIA analyst (John Malkovich). They want to sell it for their wishes – which include something as stimulating as cosmetic surgery – to be fulfilled.

Unfortunately, there are no takers. Not even the Russians!

Mind you, this is just one plot. There are wheels within wheels. The analyst’s wife is cheating on him. The guy (George Clooney) she is with is open to other options. And then, the director-duo doesn’t follow a linear trajectory in storytelling. Confusing? Not quite. Coens specialise in that before you realise the flaws, the story swishes past giving you no time to relax and ponder.

Here they have given Pitt and Clooney, two of the most expensive stars, a real image shift, something which actually makes fun of their screen personae. As the naïve physical instructor with a strange hair-cut, Pitt has given a winning performance. In comparison Clooney is bit insipid, as a guy who knows little about discretion when it comes to girls. Through Frances McDormand, we get an amazing insight into the perpetual quest of the human mind for physical beauty.

However, all is not well with this black comedy. And certainly, it is not the best from the brothers who gave us films like “Fargo” and “No Country For Old Men”. In its effort to be honest, the film leaves you cold in the end. There is nothing much to take home.

ANUJ KUMAR

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