(no subject)

[shadowkat]

First, the meme that's been going around:

Four places I have worked:
1. Marriot/Saga - Cafeteria Server/Dishwasher (College) - Colorado
2. Little Professor Book Store - Bookseller - Olathe, Kansas
3. The H W Wilson Company - Bronx/NY
4. Oberon Video Games - New York City

Four things I love to watch on TV/streaming:
1. General Hospital (soap opera)
2. Cooking Demonstration/Competition Shows (Great American BBQ ShowDown, Great British Bake Off, Is it Cake?, etc.)
3. Dramas - Justified:City Primeval, The Bear, Dark Winds,
4. Fantasy and Science-Fiction Shows

Four places I have visited:
1. Tasmania, Australia
2. Costa Rica
3. London, UK
4. Istanbul, Turkey

Four things I love to eat:
1. Salads!
2. Chocolate
3. French Fries
4. Herring in Sour Cream

Four places I’ve lived:
1. Lawrence, Kansas
2. Colorado Springs, Colorado
3. West Chester, Pennsylvania
4. New York City, NY

Four favorite drinks:
1. Lime Margarita
2. Sparkling water (especially Spindrift lemon or lime)
3. Cold water
4. Chai latte with coconut milk

**

Mother: Have you ever heard of the Great Lebowski?
ME: Yes, it's an Ethan Cohen Brother's film that everyone appears to love but me. I can't make it through it - and have tried repeatedly. Wales adores it and celebrates the holiday of The Dude. Jeff Bridges starred in it and it involves..."bowling".
Mother: Bowling.
Me: Pretty certain. Why?
Mother: Cillian Murphy recommended it in an interview - it's a favorite of his - he sees it with his sons. (We both have a crush on Cillian Murphy.)
Me: Yeah, well...I've never been able to get through that film. It's not my brand of humor or not my wheel house.
Mother: Oh, yeah, probably won't like it then.. (I doubt it - she doesn't like that style of humor either.)

Although, I've not really met anyone else who doesn't like that movie. I've been bullied into seeing that movie more times than I can count. It's gotten to the point in which I just walk away from conversations about it and let people know up front - no, not a movie that works for me - bye now. Pretending to like it - doesn't work, you end with people attacking you with lines from it (yes, people have it memorized).

Comments

[slaymesoftly]

I've never seen it. I'm only slightly familiar with it because it is so popular that it gets referenced a lot.

[shadowkat]

I keep trying. It's Wales favorite film. But I can't get past the first fifteen-twenty minutes.

[iddewes]

I’ve actually never seen the Big Lebowski so I don’t know if I would like it or not.

[shadowkat]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Lebowski

The Big Lebowski (/ləˈbaʊski/) is a 1998 crime comedy film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. It stars Jeff Bridges as Jeffrey "The Dude" Lebowski, a Los Angeles slacker and avid bowler. He is assaulted as a result of mistaken identity, then learns that a millionaire, also named Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston), was the intended victim. The millionaire Lebowski's trophy wife is kidnapped, and millionaire Lebowski commissions The Dude to deliver the ransom to secure her release. The plan goes awry when the Dude's friend, Walter Sobchak (John Goodman), schemes to keep the ransom money for the Dude and himself. Sam Elliott, Julianne Moore, Steve Buscemi, John Turturro, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tara Reid, David Thewlis, Peter Stormare, Jon Polito, and Ben Gazzara also appear in supporting roles.

[iddewes]

I know of it, though hadn't really known what the story was. It seems to have a lot of good people in it.

[shadowkat]

It depends on what you like? It didn't work for me at all.

[iddewes]

Yeah, I think I would have to watch at least some of it to know if I would like it or not. Maybe sometime.

[shadowkat]

My opinion? Don't waste your time on it. There's better things to watch.

[mtbc]

I'm yet another who's never seen it! Though of course clips appear on this or that, it being such a cult favorite.

[shadowkat]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Lebowski

The Big Lebowski (/ləˈbaʊski/) is a 1998 crime comedy film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. It stars Jeff Bridges as Jeffrey "The Dude" Lebowski, a Los Angeles slacker and avid bowler. He is assaulted as a result of mistaken identity, then learns that a millionaire, also named Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston), was the intended victim. The millionaire Lebowski's trophy wife is kidnapped, and millionaire Lebowski commissions The Dude to deliver the ransom to secure her release. The plan goes awry when the Dude's friend, Walter Sobchak (John Goodman), schemes to keep the ransom money for the Dude and himself. Sam Elliott, Julianne Moore, Steve Buscemi, John Turturro, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tara Reid, David Thewlis, Peter Stormare, Jon Polito, and Ben Gazzara also appear in supporting roles.

[cjlasky7]

Ahem. Speaking as someone who has seen the movie....

The Big Lebowski is very much Its Own Thing. It's positioned somewhere in the Venn Diagram of a 1970s new wave cinema buddy movie, a Raymond Chandleresque neo-noir (with appropriately incomprehensible plot) and a 1990s stoner comedy--without really being any of the above. (And since Sam Elliott, cowboy hat and all, is the narrator, throw in "western" too--why not?)

Jeff Bridges holds the movie together, the way the Dude's rug "holds the room together." He's hardly your typical noir protagonist; as Joel Coen has said in interviews, he's probably the person LEAST capable of untangling the plot.

But that's not important. You can look at the Dude and like him for his loyalty to his (severely) damaged friends, Walter and Donny (John Goodmam and Steve Buscemi), his vaguely anti-establishment attitide and his zen slacker chill...

Or: you can smell the patchouli on his bowling shirt and spit: "You're over 40! Get a job, loser! God!" (The Coens say the fans think about the Dude and his philosophy much more than they do.) YMMV.

Either way, the Dude will keep on keeping on in his own special way.

The Dude abides.

[shadowkat]

Looked it up. Yup, I was right, about bowling. (Cohen Brother's films that I find unwatchable: The Big Lebowski (got bored and gave up, also found it cringe-inducing to the point I had to leave the room), Oh Brother, Where Art Thou (lost interest and gave up), Barton Fink (Got bored, and gave up), Miller's Crossing (went to sleep during). Embarrassment comedy or low-brow comedy and I are unmixy things. (But you knew that already.) Cohen Brothers are really either hit or miss with me. I also couldn't get into the Ballad of Buster Scroggs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Lebowski

"The Big Lebowski (/ləˈbaʊski/) is a 1998 crime comedy film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. It stars Jeff Bridges as Jeffrey "The Dude" Lebowski, a Los Angeles slacker and avid bowler. He is assaulted as a result of mistaken identity, then learns that a millionaire, also named Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston), was the intended victim. The millionaire Lebowski's trophy wife is kidnapped, and millionaire Lebowski commissions The Dude to deliver the ransom to secure her release. The plan goes awry when the Dude's friend, Walter Sobchak (John Goodman), schemes to keep the ransom money for the Dude and himself. Sam Elliott, Julianne Moore, Steve Buscemi, John Turturro, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tara Reid, David Thewlis, Peter Stormare, Jon Polito, and Ben Gazzara also appear in supporting roles."

This movie just never worked for me. YMMV.

[svgurl]

Add me to the list of people who haven't seen 'The Great Lebowski'. Until you posted the summary in the comments, I wasn't sure what it was about either (and while I've heard the references, I've never been bothered to look it up). It doesn't seem like it would be my thing either.