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22 December 2023
\"And, you know, has it ever occurred to you that, instead of, uh, you know, running around, uh, uh, blaming me, you know, given the nature of all this new shit, you know, I-I-I-I... this could be a-a-a-a lot more, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, complex, I mean, it\'s not just, it might not be just such a simple... uh, you know?\"
- The Dude
Sometimes there comes a movie, and I won’t say \"a classic masterpiece of modern cinema\", because what is a classic masterpiece of modern cinema? But sometimes there comes a movie that is a movie for its time, and The Big Lebowski is that movie.
What hasn’t been said about this movie that I could possibly expand on in this column? How about the fact that the scene in The Big Lebowski when The Dude’s car goes missing is the inspiration for the opening exchange in another classic (in my mind), Dude, Where’s My Car? Or that in a strange bit of foreshadowing, Donny gets nothing but strikes every time he bowls, until the game just before the nihilists appear and cause his untimely death.
Here are some fun things to see how well you’re paying attention: The Dude says \"man\" 144 times, almost one and a half times a minute; the word \"fuck\" occurs 281 times. See if you can spot all the times someone says something that The Dude then says to another character, such as \"This will not stand.\" Spot a cameo by singer/songwriter Aimee Mann as the nihilist who gives up her toe. All of these are the kinds of things that you notice after watching The Big Lebowski multiple, multiple times.
And upon further reflection, you may notice the similarities between the Raymond Chandler novel The Big Sleep. But that\'s neither here nor there.
All in all, The Big Lebowski follows in the great tradition of other Coen Brothers films, like Barton Fink, Fargo, and The Hudsucker Proxy, that are there to be peeled back like the skin of an onion. What may, on the surface, appear to be nothing more than a thinly-veiled detective story or kidnap caper, is used to point out the strange idiosyncrasies that exist in all our lives. It is so rare for moviemakers to take as much time and care putting all these things into a film, but the truly amazing thing is that it doesn’t detract from the surface of the film at all.
A film like The Big Lebowski can be enjoyed on so many levels that it never gets old. It makes comments on clichés, and turns stories we’ve heard before into brand-new epics. The movie also has become even more timely, since it originally takes place during the first Bush’s Gulf War. You can’t help but compare that time to now, with the same president (in name) and the same enemy.
Apparently, back then wasn’t the only time we needed a hero like The Dude.
artid
3328
Old Image
8_1_freakfilms.jpg
issue
vol 8 - issue 01 (sep 2005)
section
entertainmental