The mysterious workings of the CIA, internet dating, the wacky eccentrics of staff that work in gym clubs: just some of the subjects that the Coen brothers explore in this Capraesque, comedy, caper.

Most closely aligned to the oddball humour of The Big Lebowski, this latest zany effort sees Joel and Ethan being reunited with Frances McDormand, George Clooney and Richard Jenkins, and working for the first time with Tilda Swinton, Brad Pitt and John Malkovich.

In terms of the story, Malkovich plays long-standing CIA analyst Osborne Cox who finds himself summoned to a meeting to be laid off supposedly because he's been rumbled as a drunkard. His job is his life and without the career, he falls swiftly off the rails - not that his wife Katie (Tilda S) is remotely interested - she's always seen him as a bit of a loser and she's a lot more interested in her illicit liaisons with dashing, married Federal Marshal Harry (George C) who comes over all hard, but also has a fairly wimpy food allergy story that he constantly lets others know about at parties.

Meanwhile across town, in a separate plot, Linda (Frances McD) and Chad Feldheimer (Brad P) work as gym puppies at Hardbodies Fitness Centre. Linda wants money for cosmetic surgery and then wants to go bigtime into internet dating, unaware that her boss (Richard K) in whom she regularly confides, carries a torch for her. The tight red-shorted Chad is never happier than when he is pumping iron to 80's disco music and enthusiastically encouraging his charges to get fitter on the machines.

Burn after Reading is a modern-day comedy of errors and most will enjoy the film for the Coen brothers humour, seeing Brad Pitt and John Malkovich in unfamiliar roles and enjoying the always-consistent Frances McDormand turn in another delightful performance as Linda.

On the whole, the film isn't as funny as it would like to be sadly, the situations are there but some of the jokes are too laboured or become slightly too repetitive. The final third also piles on the melodrama in ways that you will feel are unnecessary.

When the focus is on Osborne or Kate, the film is at its strongest and when it shifts to the gym world, it becomes slightly too farcical. The film will of course sell on the back of a decent cast and the multitude of Coen brothers fans who will quite rightly want to see it no matter what, but this isn't vintage Coens, it seems rather like something they've knocked together quickly in a desire to work with certain people and produce a screwball comedy that is suitably wacky.