Intolerable Cruelty

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * * * *)

Intolerable Cruelty, a farce cum screwball comedy about divorce, true love and despicable behaviour, would itself seem a most unlikely marriage.

On one side you have big Hollywood represented by the marquee names of Clooney and Zeta Jones as the will-they-won't-they couple.

On the other, is the writing-directing-producing partnership of the Coen brothers, whose frequently brilliant films have often flirted with mainstream acceptance. Here, they would seem to be lap-dancing for it.

Then again, Clooney was in their last, O Brother Where Art Thou. And like his dapper escaped con in that one, his Los Angeles divorce lawyer supremo Miles Massey has his goofy conceits - the whiteness of his teeth becomes a running gag - and, playing him, Clooney sure isn't afraid to look idiotic. If his brow was any more knitted, he would have the beginnings of a nice pair of socks.

The script's basics, with its gold-digging Hollywood wives taking their filthy rich successful hubbies to the cleaners, feels like a particularly hoary old chestnut.

But the combination of Coen eccentricities and Clooney-Zeta Jones' duelling keeps this one looping the loop until its near crash-landing at the end. If Clooney is happy to send up his leading manliness, Zeta Jones' casting comes with a sly wink to her real-life status. She's Marilyn Rexroth, a gold-digger who is about to take her philandering hubby for all he's got. Only, he's hired Miles and so she gets nothing. But the former Mrs Rexroth vows revenge. However, the only vows Miles will contemplate coming from Marilyn are marriage ones.

Like most Coen brothers movies, the supporting cast is a study in oddball characters - among the most memorable a fellow by the name of Wheezing Joe who provides the biggest, blackest laugh of the many on offer.

There is a higher purpose to all this low-life behaviour. Miles may be successful enough to have an industry-standard watertight pre-nuptial agreement named after him, but he's still feeling soul-sick and wondering if there's any more to life. The love of a not-so-good woman would seem to be the answer. That she's as underhand as he is, makes her all the more desirable.

It's a twisted tango, and the Coens can't help but add some off-beat rhythms to accompany them. While it's lighter, brighter and sillier than most anything the pair have done - though first film Blood Simple was also about philandering and also involved a larger-than-life private detective as this does - it's still satisfying to see the Coens warp ye olde romantic comedy to their own ends.

So no, loyal Coen fans should consider this a fling and no grounds for divorce.

Cast: George Clooney, Catherine Zeta Jones

Director: Joel Coen:

Rating: M (low level violence)

Running time: 100 mins

Screening: Village, Hoyts, Berkeley cinemas