Hands down the most quotable comedy movie of all time. This movie transcends entertainment for me, becoming a personal connection between my father and I and making an imprint on my life forever. Sounds a little extreme, I know.
“Yeah, well you know, that’s just like, your opinion, man” the legendary quote from Jeff Bridges as “The Dude” in The Big Lebowski will always hold a special place in my heart and is said about once a week by my Dad. The Big Lebowski does exactly what it was supposed to do when it was drawn up by the Coen brothers, Ethan and Joel Coen. For those that have not been able to experience this quirky Indie comedy, it is about a man, sorry, The Dude actually, who lives the chill-est Californian life you can imagine until three thugs burst into his crummy apartment harassing him about money he apparently owes them. Oh, and sorry how could I forget, the “Chinaman” who pissed on his rug– you know, the one that really tied the room together. After The Dude’s rug basks in this interrogators urine, He talks to his buddies about it, Walter Sobchak the ‘Nam Veteran and Donny who to Walter’s dictation always needs to “Shut the F*** Up.” Walter rambles on about how he needs to settle this with the one other man named Jeffrey Lebowski in the whole city of Pasadena. The Dude visits The “Big” Lebowski (David Huddleston) who is obviously responsible for this incident instead of The Dude and their discussion remains overshadowed by Big’s view on The Dude’s lifestyle. After receiving no help from The Big Lebowski, The Dude convinces Lebowski’s assistant Brandt (Philip Seymour Hoffman) he can get any rug from his residence. This comedy shows its best entertainment through mischief The Dude and his buddies get involved in during this wild mystery chase for The Big Lebowski’s money which his trophy wife, Bunny (Tara Reid) owes Jackie Treehorn, (Ben Gazzara) a porn director who’s one of Bunny’s secret lovers and actresses.
The Pros
My favorite performance other than Jeff Bridges as The Dude and John Goodman as Walter was Brandt (Philip Seymour Hoffman). I just love how he portrays a boss obsessed assistant and the cherry on top (which I noticed on my second watch) being every time he addresses The Dude when he sees him. Notice what I call the “oxymoron dynamic” between him addressing a grown man as “The Dude” in a fancy and professional manner. It’s just one of the small details this comedy/crime story gets right. I may have walked into this movie with a little bit of bias wanting to validate my dad’s opinion about this being a great movie and I realize that, but it really is a movie of its own breed.
After making numerous deep dives into rabbit holes of The Big Lebowski youtube content made by die hard fans like me, I’ve been put on to many cool little things this movie does. A really good video by The Why on youtube exposes that The Dude hears phrases from other people and pawns them off as his own ideas. There’s a few examples of this: When The Dude is writing his check at Ralph’s to buy his carton of half-and-half and President Bush is playing on the Tv inside giving a speech he hears him say, “This will not stand, this will not stand – this aggression against Kuwait.” Later when he visits The Big Lebowski, The Dude uses the same phrase but this time to signify his frustration about losing his rug: “This will not stand man, this aggression will not stand man.” Seriously, this is pretty cool under the surface stuff in the writing.
Harry Smith of NBC sat down with Bridges, John Goodman, and Steve Buscemi to conduct an extended interview which gave us a lot of insight into the stars’ opinions on the movie 20 years after its release. One of its best moments lay when John Goodman talks about a fan experience he had where someone suggested their theory that Donny wasn’t a real person and rather a figment of (most likely) Walter’s imagination. This sounds pretty outrageous and like something you’d find on reddit (which is probably where its origin is), but Goodman and Bridges give entertained it on the interview. Jeff focused in on the moment when The Dude is walking home from the alley and his phone is ringing nonstop and Donny tell’s him it’s ringing. He says “Thanks Donny” and walks out of frame. Jeff Bridges said that maybe that scene could be interpreted as The Dude playing along with the idea and playing with Walter’s head. Applying a little bit of what I learned from The Why’s youtube video, I can also make a case for Donny being a figment of Walter’s imagination because throughout the entire movie Walter’s Vietnam obsession seems pretty fake. He rolls out of the car like an idiot in the money drop-off scene and doesn’t really act like a veteran at all. Presuming that it’s possible he made the whole Vietnam thing up but acts as though he did serve, I think that it’s possible that Donny was created by him too. All the more reason to entertain this would also be that the “Thanks Donny” line is to my memory, the only line The Dude really says to Donny the whole movie. It’s always Walter telling Donny to Shut the F*** up. Putting aside all the fun and being lame and boring, we can put it all off because the Coen brothers put in a scene where Donny’s ashes are hilariously puffed into the air (and The Dude’s face).
The Cons
I find the cons of this cult classic are hard to pin down since there’s so many areas I thoroughly enjoy but I can find a few things to point out. A few other people that I’ve seen online writing their own personal reviews have this same opinion or slightly varied but it’s that the plot isn’t the main focus of the story like a movie usually emphasizes. What you are supposed to do when you watch The Big Lebowski is just watch it without analyzing and I find that because this film chose that style, I can’t turn off the part of my brain that wants to make sense of everything. For example, at first watch I was confused by the entanglement of Jackie Treehorn and Bunny and the 3 European nialists that burn The Dude’s car and throw a marmot into his bath. It’s all kind of just overwhelming and makes you literally think “What the hell is going on.”
My other con on the movie may just be unjustified because that is the actual pace of The Dude’s life but I find the movie feels a little slow and especially in the beginning and I think that’s a drawback to getting people to keep watching as the hook of the story is not strong enough in the beginning. It’s weird, my cons for The Big Lebowski all have to do with me not wanting people to hit the exit button on it.
The Big Lebowski is a great indie comedy closer to the 1990s with incredible one liner writing from the Coen brothers and a great main character acting performance. My personal experience with The Big Lebowski influences the score more than evaluating film components, but the Shobe Score is an 89.