Intolerable Cruelty (DVD)

The story goes as followed Miles Massey, played by George Clooney, is a successful divorce lawyer who must defend his client Rex Rexroth (Edward Herrmann) against his golddigging soon to be ex wife, Marylin (Catherine Zeta-Jones). Miles wins the case but can’t help be attracted to Marylin and she decides to use this to her advantage to get her revenge with hilarious results. He follows her to like a lamb to the slaughter as she tries to get his wealth while he tries to stop her by using drastic measure. Can’t really say anymore without entirely ruining the story for all you. The famous Coen brother’s directed Intolerable Cruelty. They ...  Read the complete review

The Coen Brothers have consistently knocked out great films that make respectable box office and remain distinctly independent. Intolerable Cruelty sees the pair going a bit mainstream by teaming up with Producer Brian Grazer and Universal to perhaps produce a decent hit at the box office. Well sadly the film hasn't conjured up big bucks on it's US release although this is probably due to being released at a time when there are a lot of big hitters coming out. But that's too bad as this film is another good Coen Brothers movie and one that once again validates George Clooney as an actor who chooses quality over a big paycheque. Clooney plays ...  Read the complete review

I really don't know why I picked this film up, maybe it was the lure of George Clooney!!! I was quite surprised by this and hubby enjoyed it as well which is always a good sign. At the beginning of the film we see a soap actor returning home to find his wife having an affair with an old friend and she then stabs him in the bum with one of his awards! From this we meet Miles Massey who is a top divorce lawyer and has taken on the role of the wife's lawyer. He manages to turn the whole case around and lands the wife everything and the actor husband gets left with nothing. Soon we meet Marilyn Rexroth who has hired a detective to track her very ...  Read the complete review

Introduction Intolerable Cruelty is a film that I would not usually have chosen to see, but then I found out it was directed by the Coen Brothers, Joel and Ethan (although the latter is uncredited), directors of films such as Fargo and The Man Who Wasn’t There, and decided that perhaps I should give it a go after all. There are times when I wished I’d gone with my gut feeling and this was one of them. Intolerable Cruelty has been called the Coen Brothers most commercial yet; whatever, I think it is their worst yet and I was deeply disappointed. The only excuse is perhaps that it wasn’t originally written by them; they took on the story and re-wrote it. ...  Read the complete review

Intolerable Cruelty is about as close as the Coen brothers get to a romantic comedy but even then it is pretty far removed from the traditional romcom. Catherine Zeta Jones plays the gold-digging serial wife Marilyn Rexroth and George Clooney stars as Miles Massey, the expert divorce lawyer who is standing between her and her fortune. Marilyn hatches a convoluted plot to get her hands on a prospective husband's fortune and Miles soon learns that his confidence in his ability to create an invincible prenuptial agreement. When I first saw this film advertised, I thought it looked pretty much like standard romcom fare with two beautiful people falling in love ...  Read the complete review