‘Burn After Reading’ weaves tangled web

“Burn After Reading” is a clever little tangled tale of rampant infidelity, paranoia and pseudo-espionage in our nation’s capital.

It combines great acting and a warped, yet realistic, sense of humor with genuine, multi-class banter in a way only filmmakers Ethan and Joel Coen can do.

The award-winning brothers who brought us “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” “Fargo” and “Raising Arizona” are back with “Burn After Reading” and it’s something worth watching.

Damn entertaining.

Plus, it’s in color, which is a nice switch (sorry) from the black-and-white selections I’ve been watching (for free) lately in the Mount Pony Theater.

What wasn’t a nice switch, however, was the $7 (!) it cost to see the matinee movie in the Main Street Regal Theater.

But I digress.

And so does John Malkovich as ex-CIA guy Osbourne Cox in “Burn After Reading.”

The movie starts in Langley, Va. and he’s just been demoted from a level three security clearance because, according to someone higher-up, who happens to be a Mormon, Osbourne has a drinking problem.

Instead of taking the demotion, Malkovich’s character quits the agency, but not before he verbally thrashes everyone in the office, including the Mormon, who he tells, “Compared to you, everyone has a drinking problem.” Then he storms off to his posh home in Georgetown for, ah, a drink and to pen his memoirs.

Malkovich continues this intensity throughout and it’s effective, as always; he’s not somebody I’d want to mess with. Best performance of the movie.

Brad Pitt and Frances McDormand as working class gym employees are content to take this guy on, however, after they arbitrarily find a CD of his in the locker room containing what they believe to be top-secret CIA information. They call him up, demanding money for what, in reality, are his memoirs.

McDormand, who’s starred in many a Coen brothers movie, is second best in “Burn After Reading” for her portrayal of the totally delusional, slightly aging, but still sexy woman looking for love and money for numerous cosmetic surgeries. Check her out on the phone with the insurance company, genuinely amazed and inconsolably indignant, when getting turned down, of course, for the elective procedures.

But now it’s even more crucial that the bribery of Malkovich is successful — “That could put a big dent in my surgeries,” she says.

And check McDormand out in the Russian Embassy, clutching the CIA CD, demanding rights (and money) as an American citizen. Funny stuff. Love her.

So does George Clooney as a U.S. marshal who gets mixed up in all this foolishness because of his libido. He too earns a big paycheck from the federal government and has beautiful house and a doting wife in the District.

Clooney is amusingly believable as the Georgetown gigolo and in that regard he beds McDormand’s character along with Malkovich’s wife, a pediatrician played by Tilda Swinton.

Clooney has a third girlfriend as well and always enjoys a run after sex. He brags about carrying a gun, although he’s never had to use it in his long career.
(Check out his XXX-rated invention.)

Brad Pitt, who works with McDormand at the Hard Bodies Fitness Center, is equally into the whole blackmail thing, though he’s amazingly upbeat and happy-go-lucky about it.

You’ve never seen Brad Pitt like this.

Check him out in the car with Malkovich’s character: in the shadow of the Washington Monument, classes clash and blond-headed Brad gets clocked in the nose.

Malkovich is totally disgusted with the whole affair — and life in general — and his book sounds pretty boring.

Everyone’s got road rage in “Burn After Reading” and everyone’s being followed by someone else for a variety of reasons.

Divorce lawyers, addiction, obsession, fantasy and fun times: this movie’s got it. Who knew D.C. had so many sordid secrets?

Uh-huh.

But the best is the CIA supervisor, played by J.K. Simmons, who gets wind of what’s happening and wishes he didn’t.

Two of our beloved characters have been shot dead by now.

“We’ll interface with the FBI on this dead body,” says a lower CIA level guy.

“No, no. God, no,” says Simmons’ character. “Burn the body. Get rid of it.”

Nobody knows what was learned, why any of it happened or how this one is connected to that one. Nobody with the Agency really cares either. It’s just another day at the office, but this is not just another movie.

Allison Brophy Champion can be reached at 825-0771 ext. 101 or