The Big Lebowski (1998)

[Scott]

THE BIG LEBOWSKI (1998) - Didn't like this one as much as I hoped. It's a Coen brothers film. The last 20 minutes are good and funny, but the rest wasn't that good. I liked the Sam Elliot parts. This film did absolutely nothing with Steve Busemi and I love every other film he has done. What a waste. The part were his ashes blow all over the "Dude" was funny and the fight with the Nazi's.

The film style is similiar in dialogue to Tarantino and Lynch type material, but dosn't work as well. I liked FARGO better.

[jmc]

This is my second favorite Coen film [RAISING ARIZONA is my all-time favorite.]  
It just works for me...it makes me laugh, even though I know it isn't as good as some of their other films.  

FARGO is probably a better made, better acted film, but it just didn't work for me as well as this did.

[Ash]

I was so bored by this film that I fell asleep.....and that's a rare thing for me.

[Mofo Rising]

Couldn't disagree with you guys more on this one.  While THE BIG LEBOWSKI isn't the best Coen brother's film (that would be MILLER'S CROSSING), it's far and away my favorite.  It's a movie I can watch over and over and not get tired of.

Everything just clicks into place, in that nothing really clicks into place.  The plot meanders, the characters are oddball (a friend of mine is just like Walter), the situations are mundane and bizarre at the same time, highlighted by dream sequences set to Kenny Rogers' songs. . . hell, I lost my train of thought.  Point is, the movie doesn't really have a point.

Audiences seemed to react much as you fellows when this movie was released in the theaters.  Since it's been released on video it has picked up a bonafide cult following.  There was even a Lebowski fest a few months back.

If you can get yourself to enjoy the pace and take the movie for what it is, you should really have a good time.  If I was prone to making such lists, this would definitely be one of my top ten comedies of all time.  I literally laugh out loud every time I see it.

Be sure to watch with a beverage handy.

[wickednick]

I love this movie.The Dude is my idol and some day I hope not to achieve all the things he didn't.I think its just funny how the situation just gets so out of control.Like JMC said this is probbably the Coen brothers second best film, with Raising Arizona being there best.

[Ash]

You guys can keep your Big Stinkbowski...

I thought it was crap.....
I've even given it an extra viewing and I thought it sucked just as much as the first time I saw it.

To each his own I guess.

[TheFeen]

This is one of the funniest films i have ever seen and has that rare 'replay' factor, in that it still makes me laugh no matter how many times i watch it. Walter is one of the greatest characters ever committed to celluloid and is also my personal yoda. That scene with the malibu police chief is gold.

[Neville]

I just didn't get it. The premise is great to take a Philip Marlowe plot and change both scenario and detective for comedy, but despite some good moments and some great acting -all actors are nothing short than great- it is clearly unfunny and it drags. Critics raved, I prefer "Miller's crossing" or "Barton Fink", specially the last one.

[Vermin Boy]

Personally, I'm in the camp that loved it; It's one of the few movies that never fails to make me laugh, no matter how many times I see it (along with Young Frankenstein and Pee-Wee's Big Adventure). Dunno why, it's just got a vibe that works for me, and countless lines have entered my friends' and my everyday vocabulary.

Oh, yeah, and the underuse of Buscemi was a deliberate parody of the motormouth roles he usually gets.

[jmc]

The problem with Miller's Crossing is that it came out at the same time  as about 100 other gangster films.  It didn't leave much of an impression with me at the time---I need to see it again I guess.

Absolutely hated Barton FInk.

[onionhead]

Personally, being an Albert Finney fan I liked Miller's Crossing, although I think John Turturro should have been blown away in the first scene.  Raising Arizona is a classic, but Lebowski was ho-hum.

[Scott]

I want to see MILLERS CROSSING, and I liked RAISING ARIZONA, but I didn't like BARTON FINK.

The best scene involving Bucsemi is when his ashes blew away in the wind.

[yaddo42]

I like this one a lot, although I'm not in the cult of greatness that has sprung up around the film.

I agree with Neville that's it s spoof of detective films, and Philip Marlowe in particular. I guess that I do get it in that it turns things upside down by giving us a hero who doesn't get anything right and a "central plot" that has less there than meets the eye since the oddities, coincidences, and twists actually don't add up - but on purpose.

You could also say that it spoofs Hitchcock's films since it plays on the elements of his films like "mistaken identity" and the "ordinary man in over his head who triumphs against the odds".

Besides, the acting is great all around, and Jeff Bridges gets to do another of his fun "likable loser" roles like in "Thunderbolt And Lightfoot" and "Rancho Deluxe".