In an age when cinematic battles of the sexes tend to be played out viciously, and either in bed or with firearms, it’s unusual – and incredibly refreshing – to sit down to Joel and Ethan Coen’s Intolerable Cruelty. Sure, viciousness abounds amidst the cynical divorce lawyer antics that are at the centre of the film, but the foundation of this movie is one of good natured screwball comedy, not 21st century misanthropic nastiness.
Anyone concerned that the mainstream appearances of Intolerable Cruelty, and the involvement of Brian Grazer – big-time Hollywood producer and regular collaborator with Ron Howard – might spell an end to the Coen off-kilter style can rest easy. Sure, this is perhaps a more mainstream comedy than most Coen films, but it’s still dark, eccentric, dry and wonderfully irreverent.
George Clooney clearly revels in playing slimeball lawyer Miles Massey, a man who spends far more time admiring his shiny white teeth than he does pondering the right and wrong of his work as hired legal gun to the rich and philandering. More than a little reminiscent of his self-admiring pretty boy character in the Coen’s O Brother Where Art Thou, this Clooney role is another that lets him let down his comedic hair, including several priceless scenes of physical comedy, shared with Miles’ legal sidekick Wrigley (Paul Adelstein is strikingly reminiscent of Stephen Tobolowsky). Miles’ main opponent is Marylin Rexroth (Catherine Zeta-Jones), a scheming man-hater whose goal in life is to seduce, marry, divorce and fleece as many men as possible. Miles meets Marylin when he represents her soon-to-be-ex-husband in divorce proceedings, and he’s immediately smitten. The only questions are when they will get together and which of them will truly be in love and which will be out to swindle the other.
This is one funny movie, with particular highlights including its wacky courtroom scenes (Richard Jenkins is understatedly hilarious as Marylin’s hapless lawyer), and the hijinx that ensue when Miles and Wrigley set out to stop a hit man that they have hired from following through on the contract. The results of that one will have asthmatics worldwide thinking twice before trying their inhalers in the dark – at least if they happen to have handguns lying around the house.
There are moments in this film when the dialogue is the wittiest I have heard in a very long time. The verbal sparring between Miles and Marylin is naturally the focus for this, but there’s much more here than just banter over sexual politics. It’s smart, sharp, more than occasionally silly, and great fun.
This is far more a movie about having fun with wit than it is a message film, but there’s certainly no shortage of social commentary about the wealthy, male-female relations, and cynicism versus love. When sentiment begins to inflate now and again throughout the film, you just know that the Coens are standing by with big needles in their hands, waiting for just the right moment to pop the balloon and remind us that this is all in good fun.
Clooney is fabulous, Zeta-Jones coolly on-the-mark, and the supporting players – Jenkins, Adelstein, Cedric the Entertainer, Geoffrey Rush, Billy Bob Thornton and Julia Duffy among others – add considerably to the fun. It looks like this was a cast that had a good time making the film, which is nothing new for a Coen brothers production.
Substantially darker and more twisted than the average screwball romantic comedy, Intolerable Cruelty is another successful Coen brothers genre experiment that will satisfy their fans and undoubtedly win over new followers as well.
