The Big Lebowski

When "the Dude" Lebowski is mistaken for a millionaire Lebowski, two thugs urinate on his rug to coerce him into paying a debt he knows nothing about. While attempting to gain recompense for the ruined rug from his wealthy counterpart, he accepts a one-time job with high pay-off. He enlists the help of his bowling buddy, Walter, a gun-toting Jewish-convert with anger issues. Deception leads to more trouble, and it soon seems that everyone from porn empire tycoons to nihilists want something from the Dude.

Review from rogerebert.com

“The Big Lebowski” is about an attitude, not a story. It’s easy to miss that, because the story is so urgently pursued. It involves kidnapping, ransom money, a porno king, a reclusive millionaire, a runaway girl, the Malibu police, a woman who paints while nude and strapped to an overhead harness, and the last act of the disagreement between Vietnam veterans and Flower Power. It has more scenes about bowling than anything else.

This is a plot and dialogue that perhaps only the Coen Brothers could have devised. I’m thinking less of their clarity in “Fargo” and “No Country for Old Men” than of the almost hallucinatory logic of “Raising Arizona” and “The Hudsucker Proxy.” Only a steady hand in the midst of madness allows them to hold it all together–that, and the delirious richness of their visual approach.

Anyone who cares about movies must surely have heard something about the plot. This is a movie that has inspired an annual convention and the Church of the Latter-Day Dude. Its star, Jeff Bridges, has become so identified with the starring role that when he won the 2010 Oscar for Best Actor, Twitterland mourned that his acceptance speech didn’t begin with, “The Dude Abides.” These words are so emblematic that they inspired a book title, The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers, by Cathleen Falsani. This is a serious book, though far from a dreary theological work.

Read the rest of the review from Roger Ebert here...