Burn After Reading

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Nominated for 2 Golden Globes. Edit Cast Cast overview, first billed only: George Clooney Harry Pfarrer Frances McDormand Linda Litzke Brad Pitt Chad Feldheimer John Malkovich Osborne Cox Tilda Swinton Katie Cox Richard Jenkins Ted Elizabeth Marvel Sandy Pfarrer David Rasche CIA Officer Palmer DeBakey Smith J.

CIA Superior as JK Simmons Olek Krupa Krapotkin Michael Countryman Alan Kevin Sussman Tuchman Marsh Man J. Divorce Lawyer as JR Horne Hamilton Clancy Peck Armand Schultz Divorce Lawyer as JR Horne Hamilton Clancy Peck Armand Schultz Olson Pun Bandhu Party Guest Karla Mosley Party Guest Jeffrey DeMunn Cosmetic Surgeon Richard Poe Stretching Gym Patron Carmen M.

Prospective Gym Customer Raul Aranas Russian Embassy Escort as Sandor Tecsy Yury Tsykun Senior Russian Embassy Man Brian O'Neill Hal Robert Prescott Process Server Matt Walton Morning Show Host Lori Hammel Morning Show Hostess Crystal Bock PR Woman Patrick Boll Sandy's Man Logan Kulick Four-Year-Old Patient Dermot Mulroney Star of "Coming Up Daisy" Robert R.

Drunken Princetonian Ted Bouton Drunken Princetonian Bob Bowersox Drunken Princetonian Oliver Buckingham Drunken Princetonian Michael Fawcett Drunken Princetonian William Fowle Drunken Princetonian Charles Gemmill Drunken Princetonian Mitch Giannunzio Drunken Princetonian Cliff Goulet Drunken Princetonian William D.

Norman Wilner. The Coen brothers find a way to mix both political thriller and dark comedy in Burn After Reading to give us a beautiful piece of cinema.

Danielle Solzman. The joy of a Coen Brothers film is that it IS confusing, yet somehow always remains coherent.

Richard Propes. Burn After Reading is a sort of anti-All the President's Men, a Washington movie whose unstated premise is that we should never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity.

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Just as the deceased feline will gain a moment's illusory height on hitting the floor, so a powerfully alive animal might ricochet downwards off the ceiling, stunned, after an award-winning jump.

John Malkovich stars as Osbourne Cox, a CIA agent who is summoned to the office of his superiors and sacked, apparently for having a drinking problem; the accusation comes from a priggish and religious colleague at whom Cox fires a tremendous comeback zinger which I won't give away.

His woes do not end there. He is married to Katie, played by Tilda Swinton, a paediatrician with an icy, uptight attitude who is nonetheless conducting an adulterous affair with Harry Pfarrer, a married federal marshal played by George Clooney.

Although entitled to carry a gun, Harry cheerfully tells people he hasn't discharged his weapon in 20 years' service, a revelation that will discomfit those familiar with Chekhov's maxim about what happens to a gun introduced in act one.

In a spirit of revenge for his job loss, Cox writes a lid-lifting memoir of his time at the agency's Balkan desk, and a CD containing the top-secret manuscript winds up in the hands of Linda Litzke and Chad Feldheimer, played by Frances McDormand and Brad Pitt.

They are brainless bozos who work at a gym and figure on selling this document to the Russian embassy to pay for Linda's longed-for cosmetic surgery.

Exasperatingly, the fundamental plot-point of how Cox's CD finds its way into the gym is fudged, and the story itself runs calamitously aground.

When his pediatrician wife Katie finds out, she sees it as an opportunity to file for divorce and to continue her affair with Harry Pfarrer, a married U.

Marshal with paranoid tendencies. At the instruction of her lawyer, Katie copies and delivers her husband's digital financial records and other files, unknowingly including the draft of Ozzie's memoir.

The lawyer's assistant copies the files onto a CD, which she accidentally leaves on the locker room floor of Hardbodies, a local gym. The disc falls into the hands of dimwitted personal trainer Chad Feldheimer and his coworker Linda Litzke, who mistakenly believe it to contain sensitive government information.

Chad devises a plan to return the disc to Ozzie for a cash reward, with Linda eager to raise money for cosmetic surgery that she cannot afford.

After a phone call and subsequent meeting with Osbourne provoke his furious reaction, Chad and Linda try to sell the disc to the Russian embassy , and they meet with an official there who is actually a spy for the CIA.

Osbourne's increasingly temperamental and erratic behavior prompts Katie to change the locks on their house and to invite Harry to move in.

Harry is a womanizer and routinely dates and sleeps with women whom he has met online. He coincidentally starts seeing Linda after meeting her on a dating site.

Having promised the Russians more files, Linda persuades Chad to sneak into the Cox house to steal files from Ozzie's computer.

After watching Katie and Harry leave the house, Chad enters and starts snooping around until Harry unexpectedly comes home. Chad rushes upstairs to hide in the bedroom closet as Harry enters the room and takes a shower.

After Harry has dressed, he picks up his gun and opens the closet to retrieve his holster. Startled at seeing Chad, he shoots Chad in the head, instantly killing him.

Harry searches the body for any clues to Chad's identity, but only finds an empty wallet. He suspects that Chad was a spy who had been snooping on him.

Two days later at CIA headquarters, Palmer Smith, Osbourne's former superior, and Smith's director learn that information from Osbourne has been given to the Russian embassy.

They are perplexed because the information is of no importance and the perpetrators' motive is unknown. Smith also discloses to the director that the agent whom they had assigned to spy on Harry observed Harry dumping Chad's body into the river.

The director, unaware of Chad's identity, orders Chad's death to be covered up. Harry and Katie have an argument and Harry storms out of the house when he spots a man who has been trailing him for the past several days.

Harry tackles the man and the man admits that he is working for Tuchman Marsh, [9] a law firm that Harry's wife Sandy has retained in order to divorce Harry.

Harry is devastated at the surprise revelation of Sandy's divorce plans and goes to see Linda to vent his despair. However, Linda complains to Harry that she cannot always be the one to listen to everyone's problems and confides that she has her own issues because Chad is missing.

Harry agrees to help find Chad, unaware that Chad is the man whom he had shot and killed. Linda returns to the embassy, believing that the Russians have abducted Chad, but they deny that they have him.

They dismiss the CD contents as "drivel" and escort Linda out of the embassy. She turns to Ted Treffon, the kindhearted manager of Hardbodies who has unrequited feelings for her, and begs him to help her by sneaking into the Cox household to gather more files from Osbourne's computer.

Harry and Linda meet in a park. Harry notices a man in the park who appears to be surveilling him. Linda recognizes him as a man whom she had previously dated but denies knowing him, furthering Harry's suspicions.

When Linda reveals the address where Chad had gone before disappearing, Harry realizes that Chad is the man whom he had shot. Convinced that Linda is a spy and that everyone in the park is surveilling him, he panics and flees.

Osbourne becomes unhinged when he finds out that Katie has emptied his bank accounts and breaks into the house to retrieve his alcohol and personal belongings.

Finding Ted in the basement, Osbourne shoots him and chases him onto the street, where he attacks him with a hatchet.