Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		4.0

Intolerable Cruelty Blu-ray Movie Review

To Love, Honor, Cheat and Deceive

Reviewed by Michael Reuben March 16, 2014

The Coen Bros.' affinity for crime stories and film noir is well known, largely because they first caught the world's attention with Blood Simple, but their devotion to screwball comedy is less noted. It's a form in which they have always excelled. Raising Arizona, their second film (and still one of their best), deployed all the mechanics and style of screwball comedy, but as the Coens so often do, they flipped familiar tropes sideways by setting the story among petty criminals, plus one motor-mouthed cop. (The latter role was written specifically for Holly Hunter, and it was her breakthrough performance.) The Hudsucker Proxy was a classic of the genre, with a fairytale sheen painted over it. Even the Coens' films in other genres often feature one or more characters who speak in the rat-tat-tat patois of Katherine Hepburn or Cary Grant in a 1930s romp. (Think of Steve Buscemi's Mink in Miller's Crossing or Julianne Moore's Maude in The Big Lebowski.)

While the Coens were making these films, producer Brian Grazer hired them to rewrite a script about a star divorce lawyer who makes the mistake of falling for his client's calculating wife. The original story was by John Romano (The Lincoln Lawyer) and the team of Robert Ramsey and Matthew Stone (Life), who also wrote the first screenplay. Grazer's partner, Ron Howard, originally planned to direct, and Grazer wanted the Coens to stamp the material with their unique comic sensibility. But after Howard dropped out, Grazer asked the brothers to direct the material themselves.

Miles Massey (George Clooney) is L.A.'s most successful matrimonial lawyer. He wins because he's as unscrupulous as his clientele. In an opening sequence, we watch him represent the cheating wife (Stacey Travis) of a soap opera producer (Geoffrey Rush), after she's been caught in bed with another man. Miles manages to remake the facts so effectively that the wife ends up with everything. His prowess has made him wealthy and the engine of his firm's profitability. He's also bored. His loyal protégé, Wrigley (Paul Adelstein), can't understand what ails him.

Then Miles accepts the case that will change his life. Real estate tycoon Rex Rexroth (Edward Herrmann) gets caught on video in a motel room with a nubile young lady by P.I. Gus Petch (Cedric the Entertainer), who has been hired by Rex's wife, Marilyn Rexroth. Rex was careless enough to wed Marilyn without the protection of the "Massey Pre-Nup", a legendary document created by Miles that has never been breached in any divorce case. Marylin's lawyer, Freddy Bender (Richard Jenkins), thinks that Marylin's case is open-and-shut for a rich settlement, but Rex hires Miles.

Miles can spot a fortune hunter from a mile away. In fact, Marylin belongs to an informal circle of Beverly Hills ladies whose profession is marrying rich men, then divorcing them for as much as they can get. Marilyn's best friend, Sarah Sorkin (Julia Duffy), has become fabulously wealthy this way, but she lives alone in a 46-room mansion with only a peptic ulcer for company. Miles puts his own investigators to work, and at the divorce trial he produces a surprise witness that has Marylin's lawyer gasping for objections that are increasingly laughable. Miles walks away victorious, but the victory feels hollow, because he's fallen in love with his adversary. Whether or not she returns his feelings is impossible to tell. (Catherine Zeta-Jones is particularly good at keeping both Miles and the audience guessing.)

Months later, Marylin strolls into Miles's office with her new fiancé, a Texas oilman named Howard G. Doyle (Billy Bob Thornton), and asks for a Massey Pre-Nup. Miles is floored—but also exhilarated. Finally, a new variation on the same old game.

From here on, events spiral wildly out of everyone's control, following their own comedic logic in a manner that demands that perfect sense of pacing found only in master filmmakers like Howard Hawks and the Coen Bros. Multiple weddings (with Wrigley crying at every single one of them), various iterations of the Massey Pre-Nup, a trip to Las Vegas for a meeting of the National Organization of Matrimonial Attorneys Nationwide (whose slogan is "Let N.O.M.A.N. Put Asunder"), the return of P.I. Gus Petch and the appearance of a shady character known as "Wheezy Joe" (Irwin Keyes) are among the cock-eyed developments. Through it all, Miles and Marylin keep exchanging smoldering looks and an occasional stolen kiss. Is it true love or a pair of carnivores taking a taste? With these two, maybe there's no difference.

Intolerable Cruelty Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Intolerable Cruelty is one of the eleven films (to date) shot for Joel and Ethan Coen by Roger Deakins, one of the most acclaimed cinematographers working today. Deakins supplies a rich golden glow for the monied environs in which Miles and Marylin alternately court and stalk each other, with occasional forays into contrasting environments. These include (a) the trash-strewn alley where Marylin finds an impoverished victim of Miles's hardball tactics; here Deakins brings out the grunge; and (b) the mock-sci-fi house of horrors inhabited by Miles's senior partner, Herb Myerson (Tom Aldredge), into whom billable hours seem to be directly transfused; Deakins lights him like a figure from a horror film.

Universal's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray falls in the upper range of their catalog efforts. The detail of the elaborate decor and the carefully selected costumes (the subject of a separate featurette) is finely rendered, as are the facial details in closeups and the careful coiffure of the Beverly Hills wives (and ex-wives). Miles Massey's teeth get special attention, because they're his personal obsession. The colors are well saturated and slightly exaggerated for effect. Black levels are properly set, which is essential in several slapstick night scenes involving either Gus Petch or Wheezy Joe.

The weakness, as usual in Universal catalog efforts, results from the studio's continued inclination to a look that leans more toward video than film. While the film's grain pattern can still be seen, some mild degraining can be observed, though not in a way that removes detail or leaves obvious artifacts. More troubling is the application of some light sharpening, which results in occasional video noise that might otherwise have been avoided. Fortunately, it is brief and passing.

On the whole, Intolerable Cruelty has made it to Blu-ray with an image that is sufficiently watchable to allow this light-hearted Coen Bros. outing to be enjoyed. It doesn't hurt that the average bitrate is 31.99 Mbps, which ensures that compression artifacts won't be added to the mix. But with that kind of bandwidth, why not go for a more naturally film-like appearance?

Intolerable Cruelty Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The film's original 5.1 mix (overseen by the Coens' regular sound man Skip Lievsay, who just won an Oscar for Gravity) has been presented in lossless DTS- HD MA. The mix reflects the usual "less is more" philosophy of the Coens when it comes to sound design. Except for something like the shootouts in Miller's Crossing, they tend to avoid big effects, preferring smaller sounds that establish atmosphere and underline key moments in the dialogue, like the tennis serving machine that helps illustrate Miles Massey's boredom.

As usual Carter Burwell supplies the score, having established himself as the Coens' musical alter ego. A high point of the Intolerable Cruelty soundtrack is the strategic use of several popular songs, notably "The Boxer" by Simon and Garfunkel, heard in both its original version and a cover over the closing titles by Colin Linden. Linden also sings Simon's "April Come She Will" during a wedding scene, and a version of "Bridge Over Troubled Waters" is heard to ironic effect at a key point, as is Édith Piaf's signature "Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien". The Blu-ray track delivers everything with clarity and broad dynamic range, along with clearly rendered dialogue, which is the primary element in a screwball comedy.

Intolerable Cruelty Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• A Look Inside Intolerable Cruelty (480i; 1.33:1; 12:09): The best parts of this making-of featurette are the interview segments with Joel and Ethan Coen in which they draw parallels between the characters in their script and "types" from classics of the Thirties and Forties. The principal cast and producer Brian Grazer are also interviewed.



• The Wardrobe (480i; 1.33:1; 5:10): Costume designer Mary Zophres discusses the designs for the film's costumes, with special attention to the ever-changing attire of Catherine Zeta-Jones.



• Filmmaker Approved and Assembled Outtakes (480i; 1.85:1, non-enhanced): A "play all" function is included.
• Paul Adelstein in "Everybody Eats Berries" (1:20): A dozen or more repetitions from the wedding scene.
• Ladies and Gentleman, George Clooney (1:29): Gag reel material.
• Ladies and Gentlemen, Catherine Zeta-Jones (0:56): More gag reel material.
• Rex Rexroth's Home Movie (3:33): Black-and-white vintage train footage, visible in a key scene in Rex's home.

Intolerable Cruelty Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Intolerable Cruelty is often treated as a poor stepchild in the Coens' filmography, and certainly its genesis differs from that of the films for which the brothers are most acclaimed. As Joel Coen notes in the extras, they have typically written their scripts with specific actors in mind but did not do so with this script because they didn't expect to direct it. As Brian Grazer stresses, however, their eye for casting has always been laser-like, and when they assumed the helm, they filled even the small parts in Intolerable Cruelty to perfection. The film may be among the team's fluffier creations, but as most would-be comedies demonstrate, dense and dull is easy; fluffy is hard. Highly recommended as a film; recommended, with minor reservations as a Blu-ray.