Burn After Hearing

By Steven Zeitchik

Is the lack of meaning in a meaningless film more meaningful than a film with meaning? If that sounds like the batty musings of a Coen Bros. character, it should; that's pretty much the question that media and fans dabbled in after the biggest Toronto movie of the weekend so far, the Coen Bros. don't-call-it-a-spy-spoof (it's actually more of a relationship comedy) "Burn After Reading."

On its face the picture is about little more than a set of narcissists up and down the D.C. social ladder trying to Make Something of Themselves...when in fact the only thing they're making of themselves is fools (Brad Pitt, as the prototypical Coen knucklehead, particularly chews on the cluelesness -- his line on the role -- "I've been knocking on the brothers door for a few years and I was really happy when they called, until I read the piece and then I was a little upset again." The deadpan irony even turns into downright Airplane silliness in spots. It's all pretty enjoyable in a lighthearted way (though the schtick gets a little tedious as the film wears on).

In a sense it's hard to imagine that these are not only the same people who made a theme-heavy movie like "No Country" but wrote the two pics contemporaneously.

(Ethan Coen at the press conference, to a reporter's question on whether it should color our perception of "No Country:" "Are you asking if, having seen this movie, you should take back how much you liked ('No Country')?")

The Coens also underscored the differences with lines like: "We don't relate one movie to another."

But the truth is this new pic -- with its cautionary tales about self-obsessives who deludedly think they can trump the odds -- -- isn't that different from "No Country," and though it cloaks its message in goofy hijinks and well, meaningless, it actually comes from a similarly dark place.

Of course we're probably reading too much into all this -- the Coens themselves don't really think much about this sort of thing. Said Ethan at the press conference: "You make a movie and...you don't think about it in terms that journalists think about it. And here you're sitting in a room like this and journalists are legitimately asking questions and...they think you're being coy or elusive but the fact is you don't have that much to say."

Meaning through meaningless? Volumes through silence?

Sounds like the Coen Bros.

Comments

[Pete Hudson]

It's a meaningless film though funny but a little cocky. brad can do better..

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