Internet Movie Database Movie Reviews
Three bowling partners get mixed up in a kidnapping and meet a bunch of very strange characters.
Mr. Otter and I saw this movie in the theater. We had liked Fargo, which came out two years before, very much. We thought this could be a very good movie.
It’s not. We were nonplussed. The only thing I remembered from it, besides the bowling, was the scene where they were scattering the ashes and didn’t allow for wind direction, which was pretty amusing. We thought it was pretty stupid, and when O Brother Where Art Thou? came out two years later, we figured it was the Star Trek Movie Syndrome- every other Coen Brothers movie is brilliant, and every other one is not.
So that was fine, not every movie is a winner.
Except…this movie became a cult favorite. People quoted it over and over. The Dude Abides is a well-known catch phrase. Jeff Bridges has said that of all the movies he’s done, this is the one people most want to talk about when they meet him.
And both Mr. Otter and I thought, well…it was a long time ago. Maybe we were wrong. Maybe we missed something.
So we got it from Netflix and watched it again.
And…nope.
Sure, there were moments. Some of the characters were amusing. But overall? no better than we remembered. We have no idea why it’s such a cult movie (Mr. Otter: Slackers. Must be slackers watching it…) but it sure did nothing for us.
