Violent Screwball Comedy of Literally A Battle Between the Sexes

Rating: 6/10 (7 July 2005)

Up to just beyond the half-way point "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" works as a modern screwball comedy, a less dark "Prizzi's Honor."
But the gloss of suburban satire turns unappealing when the violence first gets personal, then becomes like mutual S & M foreplay, if not disturbing abuse, and then goes completely over the top into military operations that make one wonder what has happened to law enforcement.
Staging the final battle in an Ikea-type store seems like a lame attempt to restore the satirical element of two assassins who have been living undercover as suburbanites, but it looks and feels more like a video game, though the shiny cinematography emphasizes their brittle surface environment.
So maybe it's not so much that their violence is an aphrodisiac as it is a wake-up call to stir latent emotions (including a "Lethal Weapon 4"-like scars comparison) as certainly two of the most beautiful physical specimens on the planet do have sparkling chemistry together and each keeps up the battles of both wits and guts. Brad Pitt even occasionally shows some charming vulnerability and Angelina Jolie is a droll bad ass.
The camera simply loves them and there is just enough banter to keep up interest in them as people when they are blowing up everything around them. But the dialog misses many opportunities to go any deeper into their psyches beyond cartoon characters.
The contrasts in their businesses is amusing, with Pitt's casual headquarters anchored by motormouth mama's boy Vince Vaughn incongruously and vicariously planning mayhem, while Jolie manages an all-woman high tech, high gloss operation under cover as a temp agency, including Jennifer Morrison of "House, M.D." as yet another overly efficient assistant.
The music mostly supports the comic undercurrent, including a Muzak take on "The Girl from Ipanema" contrasting with other excellent Latino selections on the soundtrack.
While once your stomach has been turned by the mutually destructive violence so that it's hard to keep laughing, this is mostly about Pitt and Jolie looking gorgeous and doing impossible things -- and they pull it off entertainingly. Ah if only real violence was about these fantasies and not terrorists.