The original “Carrie” from director Brian DePalma is one of my all-time favorite films and I’m fairly certain the remake, coming out this fall, is probably going to suck big time. But I will say that this CGI-“Carrie” remake does have some impressive credentials: “Boys Don’t Cry” director Kimberly Pierce, Julianne Moore as the religious fanatic mom, and Chloe Grace Moretz as Carrie. And despite myself, the trailer does look really good. Of course, the fact that I’m a sucker for that song “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?” doesn’t hurt either.
I’m a day late, but not a buck short on this 15th anniversary greeting for one of the greatest cult movies of the last 25 years. “The Big Lebowski” was the Coen Brothers’ follow-up to the the critically-acclaimed, multiple-award winning “Fargo” from 1996. Having loved “Fargo,” I went to see “The Big Lebowski” on its opening weekend in 1998.
My initial reaction? I enjoyed some parts of it, but ultimately thought this was a kind of “f–k you” film they made after the success of “Fargo.” There were just so many weird parts that (at first) didn’t seem to fit together that I concluded that this was a film that was going to be repository of every weird and cool idea that the Coen Brothers had, but weren’t able to put into their other movies.
It wasn’t until I watched it again a few years later that I (finally) got what made “The Big Lebowski” one of the best films the Coens ever had any involvement with. The film is not a mere depository for strange ideas. It’s a wonderful take on Raymond Chandler L.A. detective noir, only instead of a a cynical detective with a secret heart of gold as the hero, we get an aging, overweight stoner who just wants his damn rug back, man. I don’t know why this second viewing struck me more funny than the first, but it did. And I laugh more and more each time I see it. This would make a great double-bill with Robert Altman’s piss-take on Raymond Chandler “The Long Goodbye.”
“The Big Lebowski” arguably contains Jeff Bridges’ best-ever performance as Jeff “The Dude” Lebowski, John Goodman’s best-ever performance as Jeff’s gun-crazed bowling partner Walter, and a host of other stellar supporting performances by Steve Buscemi, David Huddleston, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Tara Reid.
The scene here is Jeff “The Dude” Lebowski’s porno film fantasy based on his love of bowling and his general dudeness. Nothing too salacious here, but probably not safe for work. The Dude abides!
My favorite film of 1993 (aside from Tony Scott’s Quentin Tarantino-scripted “True Romance), was Robert Altman’s “Short Cuts.” “Short Cuts” is a devastating 3 hour-plus epic about the damaged lives of multiple souls in the “City of Angels,” circa 1993. The movie complies several short stories by Raymond Carver and intersects the stories, so that the characters of each story interact with each other at various times for various reasons. It shows the randomness of life and how all of our actions (no matter how small) can have an impact on the world around us. Seeing it during a not-so-great point in my life, the film hit me like a brick to the face and I was shaken for days. This is not to say the film lacks humor. The movie is oftentimes hysterically funny, albeit in a very dark way. It also features brilliant performances by a diverse, all-star cast, including Tim Robbins, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Robert Downey Jr., Chris Penn, Fred Ward, Tom Waits, Anne Archer, Madeline Stowe, Jack Lemmon, Andie McDowell, Lily Tomlin, Lili Taylor, Frances McDormand, Buck Henry, Annie Ross, Lori Singer, Matthew Modine, Julianne Moore, and several others.
“Short Cuts” was Altman’s ultra-ambitious follow-up to his 1992 comeback film “The Player.” However, unlike “The Player,” “Short Cuts” didn’t fare too well at the box office. Despite this, “Short Cuts” was on many Top 10 lists and Altman was nominated for an Oscar for Best Director. While I enjoy “The Player,” “Short Cuts” is a far better film and its influence has grown tremendously over the years and its format about multiple characters/stories intersecting has resulted in some great films (P.T. Anderson’s “Magnolia”) and not-so-great (Paul Haggis’s “Crash”). An underrated masterpiece and my all-time favorite Robert Altman film.
From PT Anderson’s 1999 film “Magnolia,” the audacious scene where all of the lead characters (who are experiencing incredible emotional trauma) sing along to Aimee Mann’s tremendously emotional song “Wise Up.” A brilliant and artistically ballsy scene and one of the reasons PT Anderson is our generation’s greatest filmmaker.
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