Friday’s Featured Film – 3/5/10
New movies are usually released to theaters every Friday, but who’s got 10 bucks these days to drop on a movie that may well be a load of crap? Given those odds, on Friday I offer an alternative on DVD that you can rent at your local video store (or in some cases, avoid at all costs). Some will be new releases, others you may have to hunt for, but all of them are available to light up your small screen should it be a lazy Friday night.
The Big Lebowski
As I’ve written before, I’m usually a fan of any film made by the Coen brothers. It’s been repeatedly brought to my attention, though, that one of my shortcomings as a Coens fan is the fact that I hadn’t seen one of their hallmark films, The Big Lebowski. The movie is quite eccentric, even for the Coens (and that’s saying something), but it has found a cult following that likely exceeds all their other work. So, to rectify my deficiency, last Saturday night while Heather was at work my friend Josh and I rented the movie. What we found was a movie that was one of the most bizarre films I’d ever seen, but an undeniably enjoyable experience.
The movie centers around The Dude (Jeff Bridges). Real name Jeffery Lebowski, The Dude is an unemployed, perpetually high slacker who spends most of his time bowling with a couple of his friends – Walter (John Goodman), a Vietnam vet with rage issues, and Donny (Steve Buscemi), a dim-witted doormat. A case of mistaken identity gets The Dude in over his head, though, when men break into his house seeking to extract money from the free-spending trophy wife of a local millionaire who also happens to be named Jeffery Lebowski. After The Dude heads to see the other Lebowski in an effort to get his rug replaced, he finds that Lebowski’s wife has been kidnapped, and Lebowski enlists The Dude as the delivery man in her ransom. This starts The Dude on a crazy journey as he meets one bizarre character after another in an attempt to save the woman – and his own skin.
If you’ve seen a Coen film like Fargo with all its eccentricities, perhaps the best way I know to describe Lebowski is to imagine that film with the quirky factor cranked up to eleven, as the Spinal Tap guys might say. Every character is a sight to behold, from the aforementioned leads to supporting characters like Lebowski’s on-edge butler (Philip Seymour Hoffman), his artist daughter (Julianne Moore), and a crazy pedophile bowler named Jesus (John Turturro, who may never have played a normal person in a movie in his life). The film’s best moments are its character moments, with the Coens’ clever dialogue and eye for the absurd on full display throughout. However, the narrative that strings the characters together feels thin throughout, and the downside of having such out-there characters is the fact that they can often be difficult to invest in. This results in a movie that carries the audience along from dry joke to dry joke with some serious slow points in-between. In the end, it was more engaging listening to Sam Elliott’s stranger talk about the tale than it was watching the tale itself. This is a movie, though, that is worth the price of admission simply for the cast of characters that only the Coen brothers could put onscreen. Fair warning – the movie is profanity-laden throughout (if you’ve seen Fargo, you know about what to expect) and there are several scenes involving nudity as well. This is a movie that will certainly have a niche audience (that’s the definition of a cult film, after all), but if you get that niche, you’ll have a good time. – *** (out of 4)
The Big Lebowski is rated R for pervasive strong language, drug content, sexuality and brief violence.
New movies are usually released to theaters every Friday, but who’s got 10 bucks these days to drop on a movie that may well be a load of crap? Given those odds, on Friday I offer an alternative on DVD that you can rent at your local video store (or in some cases, avoid at all costs). Some will be new releases, others you may have to hunt for, but all of them are available to light up your small screen should it be a lazy Friday night.
New movies are usually released to theaters every Friday, but who’s got 10 bucks these days to drop on a movie that may well be a load of crap? Given those odds, on Friday I offer an alternative on DVD that you can rent at your local video store (or in some cases, avoid at all costs). Some will be new releases, others you may have to hunt for, but all of them are available to light up your small screen should it be a lazy Friday night.
New movies are usually released to theaters every Friday, but who’s got 10 bucks these days to drop on a movie that may well be a load of crap? Given those odds, on Friday I offer an alternative on DVD that you can rent at your local video store (or in some cases, avoid at all costs). Some will be new releases, others you may have to hunt for, but all of them are available to light up your small screen should it be a lazy Friday night.
