Movies |
The Big Lebowski
directed by Joel Coen
By
Published: Jul 06, 2017
Category:
Comedy
Someone who has seen this movie a lot — and there are quite a few people who have seen it more than a hundred times — says it’s a retelling of the Buddha’s story.
You see, Jeff Bridges — as Jeff Lebowski —has a gut in this movie, and so did the Buddha. Bridges bowls, which is nothing but a stab at perfection. He has a carpet stolen, which is the lesson about material objects. And Lebowski is known to one and all as "The Dude," which more or lessrhymes with….
I’ll stop there, you get the idea: For those who love it, “The Big Lebowski” is one deep movie. And they’re not entirely goofy on this point. It’s just like the Coen brothers to hide a spiritual classic inside a stoner comedy — after all, wasn’t ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou?’ their retelling of Homer’s “Odyssey?”
“The Big Lebowski” isn’t a dumb stoner movie — it’s a smart one. Once, long ago, Lebowski went to college, but as he says, "I spent most of my time occupying various administration buildings, smoking a lot of Thai stick, heckling the ROTC, and bowling. Tell you the truth, I don’t remember most of it…"
Now he bowls. And drinks White Russians. And smokes: "I’ve been adhering to a pretty strict, uh, drug regimen to keep my mind, you know, limber." It’s a full life. Pleasantly uneventful. Until there’s a tragic misunderstanding — some thugs mistake him for another, wealthier Lebowski. They threaten him. Bob his head like an apple in his toilet. And make off with his living room rug.
The Dude is bereft: "I really loved that carpet, man! It really tied the room together!"
Thus motivated, he sets out to recover his carpet and solve the mystery. (As another Lebowski addict has pointed out, he’s Humphrey Bogart in a very silly version of a Raymond Chandler story. Along the way, he has help from John Goodman, a Jewish Vietnam vet who’s seething with Marxist rage, generally at the czars of the bowling league: (“I told those fucks down at the league office a thousand times that I don’t roll on Shabbos!”) and Steve Buscemi (who is so hapless that, when he dies, his ashes end up blowing in The Dude’s face).
Philip Seymour Hoffman plays the courtly assistant to the real Lebowski. Julianne Moore does a turn as an avant-garde artist with a keen interest in oddball sex. Tara Reid is the bored wife of the richer Lebowski. (Her first line to Bridges: "I’ll suck your cock for a thousand dollars." His response: "Uh, I’m just gonna go find a cash machine." Not that he has a dime.) And there is a miraculous, hysterically funny cameo by John Turturro as Jesus Quintana, a megalomaniac bowler whose language isn’t even fit for the Internet.
You’ve never seen this movie? Or not seen it recently? There’s no better time to remedy that. (To buy the DVD of ‘The Big Lebowski’ or to rent/buy the streaming video from Amazon, click here.]
Such craziness is too much for one movie, and, as is often the case, you may get tired of laughing and find the second half a bit slow. Not to worry. The language will keep you awake. As a Lebowski scholar reports: “The word “fuck” (and variants) is said 281 times, putting it at No. 12 on the list of films in which that word appears. The word "man" is said 174 times during the film. ‘Dude’ is said 139 times, including variations.”
“This aggression will not stand." If someone says that to you — it’s a quote from the first George Bush, on Saddam Hussein — know she/he is a Lebowski fan. Ditto "The Dude abides." And half a dozen other snappy phrases.
But why be an outsider? Get your hands on this movie today. Next thing you know, you’ll be marking your calendar for next year’s Lebowski Fest. And marking on your wall how many times you’ve seen the film. Because, as a wise person once said about something else, when you come across a movie like this, once is not enough.
BONUS VIDEO
