The Big Lebowski: Movie Review? No, That’s Not Right…

So, as I progress through my list, I am finding myself watching movies that are completely beyond the norm for what I would usually watch. I just finished the Big Lebowski, and it is certainly not the type of movie that I usually would have watched. I am generally not into that type of humour, so I must confess that I didn’t really get it. But, I read about the movie afterward in order to discover what I was missing-and I think I can say I respect the movie after reading about it. Aaand, even while I watched it there were certainly aspects of it that I could greatly appreciate. Unfortunately, I believe the movie’s greatness really is an “insider” type of a situation. What I mean by that is-from what I can understand, you really need to understand the norms and genre of film noir to get much of the humour in the film.

Despite the above, I did enjoy the movie! I regret not paying enough attention to it, as I was often doing other things while watching it-I regret that because it certainly does have a type of wry humour to it. There is a delicious scrumptiousness to the irreverence of the movie, and the ridiculous nature of all of the different characters. Without revealing too much, the hilarity of the film is often in the fact that you really don’t know whether or not you should even be taking the plot itself seriously.

Although I did not encounter that being pointed to in particular, I think that is what I enjoyed most about the movie. I have yet to encounter a movie like the Big Lebowski where the plot itself is played with as part of the comedy, where the viewer is not even aware of whether or not what is occurring is ironic or not. Situational comedy in this film goes deeper, in that the viewer does not know whether or not the characters are in a funny or disingenuous situation. So, I guess in the end-I liked the movie. I think I may actually return to it at a later date and watch it again. I doubt I will ever become a part of the cult following that it has amassed, but I hold respect for it,