9. Chad Loses His Perfect Grin - Burn After Reading (2008)
A scene that benefits greatly from the backstory, this is technically George Clooney and Brad Pitts fifth movie together, Pitt having cameoed in Clooneys 2002 directorial debut Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind as a favour to his new best friend. You see, Clooney and Pitt are actual, legitimate best buddies in real life, and have been ever since playing those exact roles in Oceans Eleven in 2001, Danny Ocean and Rusty Ryan, two heterosexual life partners who finish each others sentences. They went on to play the roles twice more in Oceans Twelve and Oceans Thirteen, becoming well-known by the final film for playing scenes where they appeared to be practically married. Burn After Reading, a typically odd and cartoon-violent Coen Brothers caper outing, sees the pair reunite only a year after the final Oceans movie, and the film contrives to keep Clooneys womanising US Marshal Harry and Pitts utter spanner of a personal trainer Chad apart until Pitts climactic scene where Harry suddenly finds a nervously grinning Chad hiding in a closet, panics and shoots him in the head, screaming and falling over. What makes the scene even more ridiculous is that Harry and Chad are leading separate strands of the movies convoluted plot, and are about to meet, compare notes and solve all of their problems together and thanks to Clooney shooting his best mate in the face, his character never finds out exactly what is going on. Its a movie about total idiots being utterly clueless about how stupid they are, and these two take the biscuit.
Professional writer, punk werewolf and nesting place for starfish. Obsessed with squid, spirals and story. I publish short weird fiction online at desincarne.com, and tweet nonsense under the name Jack The Bodiless. You can follow me all you like, just don't touch my stuff.
