Burn After Reading
Faced with a demotion at work due to a drinking problem, Osbourne Cox angrily quits his job as a CIA analyst and decides to write a memoir. When his pediatrician wife Katie finds out, she sees it as an opportunity to file for divorce and continue her affair with Harry Pfarrer, a deputy U.S. Marshal. She copies her husband's financial records and other files, including the draft memoir, and gives them to her lawyer.
The lawyer's assistant copies the files onto a CD, which she accidentally leaves on the locker room floor of Hardbodies, a local gym. The disc falls into the hands of dim-witted personal trainer Chad Feldheimer and his co-worker Linda Litzke, who mistakenly believe it to contain sensitive government information. They plan to return the disc for a reward, with Linda hoping to use the money to pay for cosmetic surgery. After a phone call and subsequent meeting with Osbourne provoke a furious reaction, Chad and Linda attempt to sell the disc to the Russian embassy.
Osbourne's increasingly temperamental and erratic behavior prompts Katie to change the locks on their house and invite Harry to move in. A womanizer, Harry is coincidentally also seeing Linda. Linda persuades Chad to sneak into the Coxes' home to get more files from their computer. Harry finds Chad hiding in a wardrobe and shoots him.
Two days later at the CIA headquarters, Palmer Smith, Osbourne's former superior, and his director learn that information from Osbourne has been given to the Russian Embassy. They are perplexed: the material delivered to the Russians is of no importance, and the apparent motive of all the involved parties is unknown.
Harry argues with Katie and leaves the house. On his way out, he spots a man who has been trailing him for the past several days. Harry tackles the man and finds out that he is a private detective hired by his wife "Sandy" to gather evidence to divorce him. Separately, it is revealed that Sandy is having an affair of her own. Harry is devastated and goes to see an agitated Linda, who confides to Harry that Chad is missing. Harry agrees to help find Chad.
Linda returns to the Russian embassy to find Chad. The Russians have dismissed the CD contents as "drivel", and escort Linda off the embassy grounds. She turns to Ted Treffon, the kindhearted manager of Hardbodies, who has unrequited feelings for her. Against his better judgement, Ted agrees to go to the Coxes' home to search Osbourne's computer.
Harry and Linda meet in a park where Harry sees a man looking at Linda and asks her if she knows him. Linda denies knowing the man, which makes Harry suspicious. When Linda reveals the address where Chad disappeared, Harry realizes that Chad is the man he shot. Convinced that Linda is a spy and that everyone in the park is surveilling him, he panics and flees.
Osbourne becomes unhinged when he finds out that Katie has emptied his bank accounts and decides to break into the house to get his alcohol and personal belongings. Finding Ted in the basement, Osbourne shoots Ted and chases him wielding a hatchet. A CIA agent intervenes by shooting Osbourne, leaving him in a coma.
At CIA headquarters a few days later, Palmer and his director try to understand what happened. Harry has been detained trying to flee to Venezuela, as that country has no extradition treaty with the US and therefore will not send him back. The director instructs Palmer to send him to Venezuela. The director and Palmer agree to leave Osbourne comatose and deal with him if he ever wakes. The final loose end is Linda, who is promising to keep quiet if they will pay for her plastic surgery, which the director agrees to. They conclude that there appears to be no lesson for the agency to learn from the events. "I guess we learned not to do it again," the director says, despite not knowing exactly what they did, and closes the file.
comedy, dark, murder, violence, satire, entertaining