The Big Lebowski – Dude, Man

The Big Lebowski is a movie about… The Dude. The plot is unimportant, really. It’s the characters and the world they inhabit that make this an essential movie 25 years later. Going in, I know there’s a good chance Tori will not connect to this one, but that’s okay. It’s a chance I’m willing to take.

I’ll pass it over to her now.

Pre-viewing:

Nick calls our dog The Duder. I’m not really sure how he came to call Sam this. Sam has many names: Sam, Sammy, Snuggle Butt, Bubba, and most recently, Sam Bam. None of those sound anything remotely like “The Duder”, but somehow that is the nickname my husband has given our dog. All I know is that he got that name from this movie.

Post-viewing:

This is not really my type of movie, but it was necessary for me to watch it given the nickname for our pupper. I will admit that I didn’t pay very close attention to the movie and if it weren’t important for me to finish the movie and write my part of this post, I would not have finished watching it. I don’t really have anything I can talk about … I didn’t hate this movie and I certainly didn’t love it. It was more or less just something on in the background while I researched what I wanted to get for my new coffee maker (I’ll take suggestions in the comments).

Nick’s thoughts:

I really love the Coen Brothers (I took an entire class analyzing their films in college). While I don’t think this is their best work, I really loved getting to watch this film again. Unfortunately, this isn’t for everyone, which I knew going in.

Like many of the Coen’s films, this one deals with themes of nihilism, perhaps most on the nose here. Nothing matters, and any attempt to fight back against that idea is met with cynicism. It’s a very interesting worldview, one that can only be countered by the lackadaisical musings of The Dude.

The biggest strengths of this film are the perfect cast and hilarious script. The characters are written and performed flawlessly. I would name examples of actors that stood out in their roles, but that would involve me just listing the entire cast, so I will refrain.

The dialogue is so crisp and perfect. I wouldn’t change a word. This can be said about all of the Coen Brothers’ films, but this one especially.

Also, this really made me want to go bowling.