Intolerable Cruelty [DVD] [2003]

Another offering from the highly acclaimed Coen brothers sees George Clooney as Miles Massey, a divorce lawyer who always wins his case until he comes head to head with the scheming, money-grabbing, yet alluring, Mrs Marilyn Rexroth (Catherine Zeta-Jones). Miles and Marilyn each embark on their own ruthless romantic missions to outdo one another and amass great wealth. Sparks fly in this battle-of-the-sexes comedy.
A sleek George Clooney and a seductive Catherine Zeta-Jones square off magnificently in the divorce comedy Intolerable Cruelty. The plot is simple: lawyer supreme Miles Massey (Clooney) skilfully outmanoeuvres gold-digger Marylin Rexroth (Zeta-Jones) when she divorces her wealthy husband–and she sets out to get revenge. But this movie comes from the creative minds of the Coen Brothers (Fargo, O Brother Where Art Thou?), and so Intolerable Cruelty includes a Scottish wedding chapel in Vegas, an asthmatic hit man, fluffy-dog-stroking European nobility, and a legendarily unbreakable pre-nuptial agreement. Still, it’s pretty restrained for the Coens; smooth and consistent, it never stumbles as disappointingly as their movies can, but also never quite hits the operatic pitch of their best work. It’s still damn funny, though, with top-notch performances from the leads as well as Geoffrey Rush, Cedric the Entertainer and Billy Bob Thornton. –Bret Fetzer