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Saturday March 14 Burn After Reading
Set in a Washington replete with shallow self-servers and manipulators, Burn After Reading is a twisty-turny thriller-comedy, a film of intricate and expertly woven madness in a similar vein to The Big Lebowski. Tricky to describe, but it’s reminiscent of 70’s espionage thrillers with a bit of internet dating, alcoholism, personal training and sexual deviance (natch) thrown in. John Malkovich is Ozzie Cox, an aggrieved analyst at the CIA with a taste for revenge. A disc containing his reveal-all memoirs turns up at Hardbodies gym, where opportunist personal trainer Linda (Frances McDormand) sees the chance to finance some expensive buttock work. She and her airhead colleague Chad (guess who) – bounding like an enthusiastic puppy into the world of espionage – decide to raise a few bucks with a spot of blackmail and selling-secrets-to-the-Russians. In a brilliantly contrived plot of interconnected lives we also have Harry (Clooney), a VIP sleazebag bodyguard who is both virtual lover of Linda and actual lover of Ozzie’s wife Katie (Swinton), a child hating paediatrician, all of them under CIA surveillance. Like all Coen brothers movies, rich in reference to iconic movies that precede them, Burn After Reading worships at the altar of American cinema. And like all Coen brothers movies it is - to say the least - pessimistic about the human condition and sceptical as to the possibilities of democracy, Washington’s monuments to civic principle serving as an ironic backdrop to the self interested insanity of the film’s protagonists. But in spite of its bleak heart, there is great fun to be had - the craft of brilliantly intricate film making, tremendous wit and delight in language, and wonderful performances from a cast with roles tailor made to suit them
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