Burn After Reading

I went in expecting to see a really funny film. After seeing the trailer it looked like a very good comedy and after I found out my friend was going to see it at the cinema for a second time I thought, "Okay well now I've got to go."

The film definitely has some funny moments in it, but it wasn't really laugh out loud material, more like chuckle quietly to yourself. It seems to me like the film is trying to be funny the whole time. Now I don't tend to watch a lot of comedies simply because when I watch a comedy, I want to be rolling around in stitches on the floor (like with Bruce Almighty), and of the comedies I've watched 90% of them are very disappointing because this just doesn't happen (e.g. 40 Year Old Virgin, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Meet The Parents, Meet The Fockers, Along Came Polly). They just make you chuckle, which is what this film does. Sadly this isn't what I'm looking for in a comedy. I've laughed harder playing an episode of Friends back in my head.

Now I think one of the reasons for this film not being all that funny is because of the writing. If you find a lot of today's modern comedies funny then I'm sure you'll find Burn After Reading funnier than I did. But the writing wasn't my biggest problem with the comedy, it was the music.

The music in this film really is amazing, but the trouble is, half the time it doesn't fit the scene. I'm expecting music that is a little lighter and funnier to be playing, in order to go with the jokes, but instead we are given dark and twisted music that is beautiful but inappropriate. It is almost like the music is scoring the subplot, while the characters laugh and joke about what is actually going on. The music makes you concentrate more on the subplot and so distracts you from the comedy making the film less funny then it already is.

Now you might be thinking that this is what the film is trying to do, and it probably is because I can think of no other reason why the film would be scored as it is. But for me this combination just didn't work and I was really put off by it. The trouble is the music is so good that it almost makes me want to go and write a dark film in order for the music to have something that matches it.

If this film was rewritten and had the comedy taken out of it I think it would be an excellent film, because the story really is quite dark and interesting. But because it is a comedy I have to say whilst I wanted to like the film, in actual fact I must be honest with myself and say that I didn't really like it that much. But hey, my friend went to see it twice so I guess it depends what films you really like. I'm just telling my side of the story.