Could it be? A mainstream movie from the Coen Brothers? Well, maybe not quite -- Intolerable Cruelty is playfully exaggerated, more witty than base, and filled with colorful characterizations -- all trademarks of the brothers. However, for a Coen movie, it's surprisingly... straightforward.

What we may be witnessing is the result of a marriage between mainstream marketability and distinct artistic sensibilities. Writer/director brothers Ethan and Joel (who always gets sole credit for directing) Coen aren't known for turning out movies readily accessible to the public. Their works are sly, quirky, dark, yet very funny. They prefer their comedy black. They love detailed art production, beautiful cinematography, and referencing classic movie genres. And their consistency in delivering their brand of cinema has won them a devoted following among those who fancy themselves as true movie-lovers. Even I, who at first had strong reservations about any Coen movie I had seen, have warmed up more to the brothers since the time I wrote a ho-hum review for The Man Who Wasn't There. I've come to appreciate what the Coens do because they often deliver the unexpected -- professionally and with great skill, I might add.

Perhaps this is why Intolerable Cruelty caught me off guard. As I began to say earlier, it's quite straightforward. It's a perfectly genial, albeit lovingly screwy romantic comedy. Visually, it's colorful, but pretty normal. Plot-wise, it goes in one direction and ends up where you'd expect it to. Nothing comes out of left-field. No outstanding bizarre acts of ironic misfortune or miraculous serendipity. No random occurrences of sickly funny violence. No horrendously botched plans through fits of passion that lead to desperate events and perhaps more than one dead body (OK, not exactly true, but what we get is pretty toned-down). Just a story where George Clooney's slick divorce lawyer and Catherine Zeta-Jones's gold-digger try to outwit each other, and, for the most part, succeed.

This is not to say the movie doesn't retain those Coen touches -- the characters, from Billy Bob Thornton's talkative oil tycoon to Irwin Keyes's asthmatic assassin "Wheezy Joe," are all cut from the Coen cloth, delicious in their dialogue and delightfully alive as movie characters. And the events that occur are comedically inventive, which is sometimes too much to ask from your average mainstream comedy. The Coens are also known for getting fantastic performances from their stars, and here Clooney and Zeta-Jones are very much the ones to watch. It's their movie, and they make the most of it -- they put on a show with their exaggerated characters, acting as if they have an active investment in making sure the audience is entertained.

Yet, the film noticeably lacks an edge -- it exists as a happy medium between the Coens and a movie specifically designed to draw crowds in for a harmless evening of fun. The good news? The result is something very slick and highly entertaining -- reminding one of the classic marriage between director Alfred Hitchcock and producer David O. Selznick in creating 1940's beloved Rebecca, a successful movie any way you slice it, but one that feels just a little right-of-center from Hitchcock's usual work. With Intolerable Cruelty, Brian Grazer, a man who knows very much how to make a mainstream success, and Ethan Coen share producer credit, and the same thing happens -- it's a good movie all-around, but it feels a bit off from the usual Coen fare.

It's strange for me to view Intolerable Cruelty at this time in my movie-going life. For the last few years, I had voiced displeasure at the general inaccessibility of movies by the Coen brothers, arguing that their plots had no focus and their cinematic atmospheres, though beautiful, were often clinically cold because of how conspicuously, consciously designed they were. In those days, I may have loudly championed a work like Intolerable Cruelty for toning down the brothers while highlighting the best in their humor, operating with a neatly tight plot. Now that I've come to appreciate their quirks and the craziness of their stories, I find their new movie a little too well-packaged and a bit watered-down. Still, as comedies go, it's tops -- even watered-down Coens come with the guarantee that the audience is in for smarter-than-usual humor.

(Released by Universal Pictures and rated "PG-13" for sexual content, language and brief violence.)

Review also posted at www.windowtothemovies.com.