The movies of the brothers Coen—Joel and Ethan—often resemble meandering shaggy dog stories, especially the comedies. So does their new one, Burn After Reading, until it hypes itself into a frantically lethal farce. It’s also the nearest to a topical spoof of all their films, the object of the send-up being the American intelligence agencies, and the mindset of their members. The Coens don’t actually probe very deeply, and they don’t seem to have brought much of a point of view to these proceedings. They seem more intent on keeping their expanding intricate movie and its cast of grotesques, goofs, delusional narcissists, and largely clueless conspirators in spiraling and intersecting motion. Along its wayward course, it offers a number of sharply funny sequences and bits of business, without ever really resolving itself into a richly comic design.

Clare Boothe’s waspishly comic 1936 play, The Women, with its famous all-female cast, is an antique, but it’s still good for some guilty laughs, although to enjoy them requires a little attitude adjustment. You’ve got to relinquish any nagging concerns about political correctness and gender ethics.