The Big Lebowski is twenty-five years old now, man time sure fly is by so fast and yet movies age like fine wine. Especially when it comes to The Big Lebowski, written and directed by the Coen Brothers the same geniuses behind such great classics like Fargo, Blood Simple, and No Country for Old Men. The Big Lebowski is one of those films like Major League where you can recite a line or dialogue, and everyone can know what that movie is in a blink of an eye. Sure, I can review another Oscar movie for this year’s Academy Awards, but this was one of the best decisions I have ever made in terms of sitting down and re-watching a classic. Now do not get me wrong I still consider this a great classic that still stands the test of time, but holy crap I still felt a little on the confused side in terms what the story and the inconclusive ending it has, though in all honesty that why it is considered a cult classic.
Jeff "The Dude" Lebowski (Jeff Bridges) is mistaken for Jeffery Lebowski, who is The Big Lebowski. Which explains why he is roughed up and has his precious rug peed on. In search of recompense, The Dude tracks down his namesake, who offers him a job. His wife has been kidnapped and he needs a reliable bagman. Aided and hindered by his pals Walter Sobchak (John Goodman), a Vietnam Vet and Donny (Steve Buscemi), master of stupidity.
Twenty-Five years old and the film itself is still hilarious from start to finish. As a fan of this movie, you can defiantly watch this for some time in a while and recite any one liner and still have a great time watching the film and like I said again this is up there between Major League, in the category of best comedies you know by heart. I am not going to go much length in terms of the actors that bring the story to life and its characters but give more of a backstory behind how the Big Lebowski was developed and believe me the development is intriguing to hear about. The character of The Dude was based on The Coen Bros, producer behind their first movie Blood Simple, Jeff Dowd who just so happens to be that man based on Jeff Bridges, for which preferred to drink White Russian's, who of all people liked to be known as The Dude. The Dude as a character was also partly based on a friend of the Coen brothers, Peter Exline who was a Vietnam vet who reportedly lived in a rundown of an apartment, just like Jeff Bridges character in the movie and was proud of a little rug that "tied the room together". Both Peter Exline and the Coen Bros became friends through the course of the years after the success with Blood Simple and in 1989, told the brothers all kinds of stories from his own life, including ones about his actor-writer friend Lewis Abernathy (one of the inspirations for Walter aka John Goodman's character) a fellow Vietnam Vet who later became a private investigator and helped him track down and comfort a high school kid who stole his car, so bottom line is that this was a huge story research of using two guys as inspiration for a cult classic that stands the test of time, but most importantly a great story of using inspired events into a Raymond Chandler mystery/wacky comedy. Now the Coen Bros, stated that yes, they used these real-life friends as inspiration but most importantly wanted to create a Big Sleep type mystery where a hippie bum lost from the 1960's gets involved in a bizarre kidnapping case and to be truthful looking up this story that is creative when you think about it, despite being puzzled at times. I almost forgot that Academy Award winner sir Roger Deakins was the cinematographer behind The Big Lebowski, for which makes a tone of sense because let’s be honest he did a ton of work with Joel and Ethan Coen through the years including Fargo, and a lot of scenes where The Dude is tripping out or knocked out and has a bizarre acid like trip is truly outstanding including one favorite scene where the Dude is somehow trapped in the thumb hole of the bowling ball and we see a point of view of the ball going through the pins and the way they achieved this was they mounted a camera "on something like a barbecue spit" according to Ethan, and then dollied it along the lane. Though the challenge for them was figuring out the relative speeds of the forward motion and the rotating motion. With the help of CGI was used to create the vantage point of the thumb hole in the bowling ball. Now granted I do have a Blu-ray copy of the movie, so I am having read how they we are able to accomplish that shot is incredible and I'd now want to see how they we're able to do that because that's something I've never figured out. Granted I've said this a bunch of times on this review of how great this film is and sure I could say great things about Jeff Bridges, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi and Julianne Moore's performances in the movie but deep down it's like retelling how amazing Star Wars is, now granted there's a lot of people out there that don't quite get this movie at all, hell I had my Dad watch this movie while back and he didn't get this at all. So, if you do not like the movie because you do not get the story, I can totally understand your reason. Though now that this film has stood the test of time on its twenty-fifth birthday, I would highly recommend watching this hilarious comedy from start to finish moreover if you have not heard of Joel and Ethan Coen, I would also recommend checking out there films as well, so you can be a fan of their work as well.
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