THE BIG LEBOWSKI

INTRODUCTION: Its been a quiet weekend for me. Sure I went to London, got involved in a demo, got held by the police and ended up getting drunk in a bar discussing politics with a bunch of Trotskyites (yeah I thought that they were an extinct species too), but I only got to see two films. I guess sometimes things don't turn out the way we expect, as this film ably demonstrates. 

Following the success of "Fargo", the Coen brothers release their most commercial film to date, but fear not, Hollywood has not blunted their satirical edge or sapped their slacker ethos. All of human life is here in this darkly comic homage to Raymond Chandlers "The Big Sleep". 

SYNOPSIS: Wanting nothing more than a quiet life drugged-up down-and-out Jeff The Dude Lebowski (Bridges) finds himself mistaken for his namesake, a millionaire business man, whose wife owes money to a local porn king. After being set upon by a pair of debt collectors, The Dude sets forth on a mission to replace his recently marked, in the territorial sense of the word, favourite rug. The Dude gets caught up in the kidnapping of the big Lebowki's trophy wife. 

REVIEW: The plot is deliciously complex, as one would expect from the Coen brothers, but ultimately it goes nowhere, as one would expect from the Coen Brothers. The traditions of the film noir are turned on their head as our hero goes on his journey of discovery, but ultimately gets nowhere and achieves nothing. He remains unchanged by his experience because in the final analysis he does not need changing. 

The humour is as key to this piece as the plot, "Blood Simple" meets "Raising Arizona" if you will, coming from its characters rather than contrived situations. The dialogue is so crisp and witty that the cast could not go far wrong. 

Once again playing on the US class system, the plot pits the poor white trash from the bowling alley against the decadent denizens of LA's upper classes. The eventual victors are never in doubt (did I mention I'd spent the weekend with a group of Trots) as the working stiffs and the upper class snobs are played completely within stereotype. 

In the blue collar corner, Jeff Bridges plays up his image as Hollywood's last non-conformist idol, in his part as 60s survivor, but only just, The Dude. Goodman is, as ever, faultless in his portrayal of an obsessed Vietnam Vet. Sam Elliott turns up and narrates in the amusingly unnecessary role of the The Stranger and there are even roles for Coen stalwarts John Turturro and Steve Buscemi. I think there was a law passed in the early 90's making it illegal to make a movie in the US without Buscemi's presence. 
In the blue blood corner we have your standard cast of arrogant business men, fawning lackeys, rebellious wives/daughters and, of course, a band of German nihilists. 

This film contains some of the Coens most stunning visuals to date from the balls eye view of a bowling alley and the Busby Berkley dance routine of The Dudes acid flashbacks to the trapeze swinging, trampoline bouncing' avant-garde life styles of the artier characters. 

At times the plot seems to come a distant third to the characters and the visuals, creating a truly glorious victory of style over content. The plot twists and turns true enough but often it seems to do so for little reason other than to infringe on the Dude's bowling practice, and to introduce us to the bizarre inhabitants of this surrealist take on LA, and the visuals that go along with it. 

You want zeitgeist, these guys got zeitgeist by the bucket load. 

Mutts Rating: **** 

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