Episode 168: The Big Lebowski vs Pulp Fiction (Pt. 2)

[00:00:00] Very Bad Wizards is a podcast with a philosopher, my dad, and psychologist, David Pizarro, having

[00:00:06] an informal discussion about issues in science and ethics.

[00:00:09] Please note that the discussion contains bad words that I'm not allowed to say, and knowing

[00:00:14] my dad, some very inappropriate jokes.

[00:00:17] The Chinaman is not the issue here, dude.

[00:00:19] I'm talking about drawing a line in the sand, dude.

[00:00:22] Across this line, you do not!

[00:00:24] Also, dude, Chinaman is not the preferred nomenclature.

[00:01:08] Welcome to Very Bad Wizards, I'm Tamler Sommers from the University of Houston.

[00:01:21] Dave, what makes a man?

[00:01:28] Definitely a penis.

[00:01:29] Oh no, just kidding.

[00:01:31] Well that's the reference, so you're close.

[00:01:35] It was actually an instance of me just trolling the listeners.

[00:01:41] I'm a firm opinion that it's whatever we want it to be.

[00:01:47] Manliness can change over time, you know?

[00:01:50] I don't know.

[00:01:51] I don't know.

[00:01:52] It's like if I'm feminine, I'm still a man.

[00:01:56] I don't understand.

[00:01:57] I really...

[00:01:58] Maybe this is why in the discussion of Lebowski and masculinity, I just don't really understand

[00:02:07] what it is even to be a man.

[00:02:09] It's not that I believe it's all 100% socially constructed, but so much of masculinity is, except

[00:02:14] for the lack of color blue.

[00:02:16] I think that's my final definition.

[00:02:18] Liking the color blue is what makes you a man.

[00:02:22] That was awesome.

[00:02:23] I did not expect that question to elicit so much discomfort.

[00:02:29] You made me very, very reflective.

[00:02:31] I'm very...

[00:02:32] Oh my God.

[00:02:33] I think I'm just not much of a man.

[00:02:36] What am I going to say here?

[00:02:38] Not getting in trouble.

[00:02:39] Not get shit on.

[00:02:41] Oh, wow.

[00:02:42] So it might not get better than that this episode.

[00:02:46] Definitely we should do a whole episode with just me uncomfortably talking about what

[00:02:56] it means to be a man.

[00:02:58] And then we can follow that with what it means to be black about that.

[00:03:01] Yeah, that's perfect.

[00:03:03] Anyway, so today we're going to talk about the Big Lebowski, which we have recorded already.

[00:03:12] We've already got an email about the pronunciation of Lebowski throughout the film, I believe,

[00:03:17] and perhaps throughout the episode.

[00:03:18] Yeah, I don't think that's right, but...

[00:03:20] I do not know.

[00:03:21] I think that's correct.

[00:03:24] But in the first segment, we're going to talk about the topic of trolling and what

[00:03:28] that is, what that means.

[00:03:31] I was listening to my favorite Twin Peaks podcast, Diane again.

[00:03:35] I was listening to one of their old episodes where they were doing listener feedback and

[00:03:39] someone asked whether Lynch and Frost were trolling Twin Peaks fans even a little at some

[00:03:46] points in the third season.

[00:03:48] If you haven't seen it, which you haven't, that won't make sense, but it does make

[00:03:52] sense.

[00:03:53] It makes sense as a question.

[00:03:55] And so that made me think about just trolling in general because they talked about what

[00:03:59] does that even mean?

[00:04:00] What counts as a troll?

[00:04:02] What are the conditions, necessary and sufficient conditions for a troll?

[00:04:09] We certainly have possibly at least been on the receiving end of some trolling because

[00:04:14] of the podcast.

[00:04:16] So I want to just talk about that.

[00:04:18] Is it different or are the conditions different if you're talking about Twitter or Reddit

[00:04:22] or YouTube or works of art?

[00:04:24] Can works of art even...

[00:04:25] Is that even possible for a work of art to troll their audience or is it just...

[00:04:31] Does that just provocative art?

[00:04:33] Right.

[00:04:34] Right.

[00:04:35] So what are your thoughts?

[00:04:38] I mean, I have one real...

[00:04:42] It forced to come up with a definition.

[00:04:46] So a troll is somebody who intentionally is posting something to upset other people.

[00:04:55] To elicit whatever negative emotions are...

[00:04:59] Getting them riled up.

[00:05:00] Inflaming, riling them up.

[00:05:02] And I think that to count as a troll it has to be insincere.

[00:05:10] You have to be posting something knowing that your only reason is to inflame people

[00:05:15] because there are plenty of people who inflame people who are doing so sincerely

[00:05:20] and that I wouldn't count that as trolling.

[00:05:23] So for me trolling is a really interesting kind of activity because what it's doing

[00:05:30] is it's preying on the weakness of people to have to respond whenever they disagree

[00:05:37] with something and unreflectively responding as if the comment was sincere.

[00:05:43] Right?

[00:05:44] So it's playing on people's lack of ability to sense irony in the troll.

[00:05:49] Or just playing on there, just getting so...

[00:05:52] If you've done your job as a troll, at least as how they conceive of it,

[00:05:58] it doesn't even have to be that they don't have a good sense of irony.

[00:06:01] It just has to be that you hit a nerve that they just get so enraged

[00:06:08] that they have to respond without even thinking about whether this is a troll or not.

[00:06:14] So here's a question then.

[00:06:16] If you see a comment and it really pisses you off and you want to respond

[00:06:23] and somebody says, don't worry, that's just a troll

[00:06:27] and you're convinced that they are actually insincerely posting it just for your reaction.

[00:06:31] Does it remove your...

[00:06:34] Anger?

[00:06:35] ...fire?

[00:06:36] Yeah.

[00:06:37] Yeah, I mean, I have a separate sort of question about why people troll.

[00:06:43] What's the psychology behind wanting to do that?

[00:06:46] At the same time, I know I do it with my family all the time.

[00:06:49] I feel like you do it with me on this episode, on this podcast all the time.

[00:06:53] I'm like, you can't really believe this.

[00:06:56] No, but I do love getting a reaction and sometimes I will do it.

[00:07:01] And it's just for the pure fun of getting a reaction

[00:07:05] and then having the person realize, oh, I fell for it.

[00:07:08] I do, but it matters to me that the person knows me

[00:07:11] and that they will eventually know that I was just trying to get a rise out of them.

[00:07:18] Right.

[00:07:19] Right.

[00:07:20] What I don't fully get and what I never...

[00:07:22] I've definitely never done it

[00:07:25] and I don't have any desire to do it is just troll somebody I don't know

[00:07:32] and then like have them think, oh, I was I was I was just being a dick.

[00:07:36] I mean, there's part of part of what being a troll

[00:07:40] is usually some degree of anonymity.

[00:07:43] So it's whatever credit they're getting as being a troll

[00:07:48] is not to them personally, because I think that I feel like there is a way

[00:07:52] in which the anonymity allows you to be a really...

[00:07:55] I don't think it's necessary because.

[00:07:58] Right, it could very well be that Lynch is trolling.

[00:08:01] Well, I don't know.

[00:08:02] Well, like I want to but let's set that aside.

[00:08:04] As to what they get from it, like it's, you know,

[00:08:06] it's like some men just want to watch the world burn kind of thing.

[00:08:10] I feel like that you get this satisfaction of the fact that you were like,

[00:08:15] it's almost like releasing a virus out into the world with no, you know,

[00:08:19] there where there's no purpose in terms of like monetary gain or attention.

[00:08:23] You just want to see shit go down.

[00:08:26] I mean, that's literally that's literally if you talk about viruses

[00:08:30] and metaphorical sense, maybe not literally, but the Russian bots

[00:08:34] in the 2016 election were for the express purpose of doing that.

[00:08:39] You know, just seeing the American election burn.

[00:08:42] Yeah, right. Yeah.

[00:08:44] Well, one could argue that it was with the very specific purpose

[00:08:48] of getting Trump elected, but I actually don't know.

[00:08:53] Yeah, yeah. But I mean, like the way that even if that was it

[00:08:56] that they were that they were trying to do it was just by getting everyone

[00:09:00] so angry, angry and outraged on both sides that it might lead to that result.

[00:09:06] Yeah. And it's actually scary.

[00:09:08] I mean, it's really is a vulnerability.

[00:09:10] It's an exploit in the human brain, right?

[00:09:12] We've talked a ton about outrage, but like to

[00:09:15] insincerely promote outrage through bot accounts is the ultimate

[00:09:20] the ultimate in trolling.

[00:09:21] And yeah, at that point, like I think you're right.

[00:09:24] It's almost not trolling then.

[00:09:27] Yeah, because it's for such a specific purpose and not just for the nihilistic

[00:09:33] delight of, you know, I sometimes feel this way about hecklers,

[00:09:37] which is another mindset I can't I can't get into the head of somebody

[00:09:42] who wants to heckle a comedian in a club.

[00:09:45] But but I think those two things are different.

[00:09:47] I think the first that one is about drawing attention to you.

[00:09:52] It's right.

[00:09:54] So there's an interesting and we'll put a link to the Wikipedia page.

[00:09:58] There's an interesting little section in the Wikipedia page on Internet Troll

[00:10:02] and it and its referencing, so I'll quote,

[00:10:06] researcher Ben Radford wrote about the phenomenon of clowns in history

[00:10:10] in modern day in his book Bad Clowns and found that bad clowns have

[00:10:12] evolved into Internet trolls.

[00:10:14] They do not dress up as traditional clowns, but for their own amusement,

[00:10:17] they tease and exploit human foibles in order to speak the truth and gain a reaction.

[00:10:22] And that until that last sentence, I'm with it.

[00:10:26] But you know, if a standard comedian is

[00:10:31] using humor, sometimes insulting or outrageous humor in order to speak truth

[00:10:38] often, not always, obviously.

[00:10:40] But I think the troll really is more like the watch the world burn.

[00:10:43] Like, I don't think they're doing it for truth at all.

[00:10:46] Well, I mean, I don't think he's a troll.

[00:10:49] But if anything like Andrew Dice Clay or some of or or to use a more modern example,

[00:10:56] Anthony Gesselnick, whole like he has a whole persona of just being a totally offensive asshole.

[00:11:04] I still wouldn't call him a troll.

[00:11:05] It is he is adopting a persona for the purpose of his comedy.

[00:11:11] So yeah, I get like, that's a good question.

[00:11:13] Can a stand up comedian be a troll?

[00:11:16] I don't think so.

[00:11:18] They can be not funny or they can piss people off or.

[00:11:24] But you know that there's a certain level of insincerity.

[00:11:27] Yeah, did we talk about?

[00:11:31] I think we talked about you.

[00:11:32] You might have pointed this guy out to me that the liberal wrestler.

[00:11:38] Oh, yeah. Right.

[00:11:40] That was hilarious.

[00:11:43] Really matters.

[00:11:44] I mean, in some ways, Stephen Colbert could be considered a troll for conservatives.

[00:11:50] Right. He's he's playing the old Colbert.

[00:11:53] The old Colbert. Yeah.

[00:11:54] He's playing this persona being an ultra conservative

[00:11:58] and trying to point out the stupidity of conservatism.

[00:12:01] I guess there's a there's a mission for Colbert there.

[00:12:04] But but it seems as if it's pretty.

[00:12:07] It's a pretty good troll.

[00:12:09] I don't know if that's trolling.

[00:12:10] I think that's just parody.

[00:12:12] That's just like Saturday Night Live is not trolling when they do Trump.

[00:12:17] No, but but there is no there's no Alec Baldwin playing Trump

[00:12:22] isn't pretending to be sincere.

[00:12:25] Right. Like that that is parody.

[00:12:28] I think there's something about, say, this liberal wrestler who is like,

[00:12:31] no, seriously, you know.

[00:12:34] Oh, no, I think the liberal wrestler might be a troll.

[00:12:36] But for some reason, I don't think Colbert was a was trolling.

[00:12:40] I think it depends on whether or not you think that.

[00:12:43] You know, I think that not a viewer might actually think that Colbert

[00:12:47] is really conservative. Right.

[00:12:50] Yeah, which nobody does because you wouldn't watch the Colbert show

[00:12:53] if you thought that he was being fully sincere.

[00:12:57] No, I agree. I agree. Yeah, you're right.

[00:12:59] But the liberal wrestler, although wrestling is something where you kind

[00:13:03] of purposely suspend your critical fat, like there can't be heels

[00:13:09] unless everybody goes in there thinking that, you know, all right,

[00:13:14] I'm not going to ask myself any deep questions about what extent they mean

[00:13:18] this and to what extent they don't. Right. Right. Right.

[00:13:22] Yeah. Huh.

[00:13:25] But yeah, I love that liberal wrestler.

[00:13:27] That was we should put a link to that.

[00:13:29] It was brilliant.

[00:13:30] Can we talk a little bit about about this bit?

[00:13:32] What people have called the benign droller 10 M.

[00:13:35] So I send you this link.

[00:13:36] Yeah, because another possible category is that they're malicious like.

[00:13:41] Right. And I don't think that you have to be malicious to be a troll.

[00:13:45] I think you do have to be insincere and your point is to get people riled up.

[00:13:50] But I don't think you have to be malicious.

[00:13:52] And this is a great example.

[00:13:53] Yeah. So so listeners might have heard of this guy.

[00:13:56] This guy's been a legend for a long time.

[00:13:58] This guy named Ken M.

[00:14:00] Who I guess started out.

[00:14:02] We'll put a link to an article about him from Gizmoda

[00:14:05] who started out on Yahoo Answers by just playing somebody

[00:14:11] who's who's ignorant and overconfident in their in their posts

[00:14:17] and has an ove like a body of work that's just brilliant.

[00:14:22] The people, you know, I think there's probably a subreddit dedicated to just his trolling.

[00:14:26] I'm trying to find a good example.

[00:14:28] OK, so here's one.

[00:14:29] It's an article. So he'll go on news sites. Right.

[00:14:31] And so this one high school recalls a yearbook

[00:14:34] over photos showing sex acts.

[00:14:36] This is from Reuters or Yahoo News.

[00:14:39] And he quote, he writes another Yahoo article with no photo attached.

[00:14:44] And this is just so somebody replies it with true outrage.

[00:14:47] Are you a child molester or just like looking at kids?

[00:14:51] You sound sick.

[00:14:53] This is of course not.

[00:14:54] But they could edit the pic so that it isn't child porn anymore.

[00:14:58] It just be a matter of photoshopping adult genitals on them.

[00:15:01] I have I have two favorites.

[00:15:03] That's a great one because it's a great thing about how he doesn't.

[00:15:08] He just never gives up the game.

[00:15:10] Like never breaks character.

[00:15:11] He never breaks character.

[00:15:13] So a clip season on Mars, so curiosity, which I guess is one of their rovers.

[00:15:21] It took photos.

[00:15:23] So it's clip season on Mars.

[00:15:24] So curiosity took photos and then there's a photo of Mars.

[00:15:28] Ken M says the rover would be wise to refrain from sightseeing and stick to its job.

[00:15:35] Sightseeing is its job.

[00:15:37] That somebody says it can do that on its own time.

[00:15:40] Every minute there cost billions of my tax dollars.

[00:15:44] You're an idiot.

[00:15:45] The whole point of every mission to Mars is to sightsee.

[00:15:49] And then like, well, it must be nice to be paid to be a tourist

[00:15:52] when we're all busted.

[00:15:56] Oh, God, he's so funny.

[00:15:59] And and perhaps in what it just another epic move.

[00:16:03] This is a gizmodo article from 2015.

[00:16:06] Very first comment is fuck this dude.

[00:16:09] He sounds like an annoying asshole posted by Ken M.

[00:16:14] That's right.

[00:16:16] I feel like we have some some some work to do for the necessary

[00:16:19] insufficient conditions of trolling, but I feel like we've got the family resemblance down.

[00:16:23] Yeah, definitely.

[00:16:24] And the thing is an expert troll is really good at the psychology of outrage.

[00:16:30] Like, I mean, you and I both have to be talked down every once in a while by being told,

[00:16:34] like maybe it's because we're not sure whether they're trolls or whether they're

[00:16:37] sincerely saying something that we find very, very disagreeable.

[00:16:42] Well, because often that's the only options.

[00:16:44] They're either severely mischaracterized, hostily mischaracterizing

[00:16:49] something we said or they're trolling in either way.

[00:16:53] We shouldn't respond.

[00:16:57] That's right.

[00:16:57] It's a it's a hilarious sort of

[00:17:01] praying on a weakness that that we would need to respond like, you know,

[00:17:05] like somebody is wrong.

[00:17:07] I have to, you know, like how could I let this stand?

[00:17:09] It is if somebody said that to your face, of course, you'd want to correct them.

[00:17:13] Having to suspend that reaction on the Internet is something that's like,

[00:17:17] you know, it's a it's a modern day necessary skill.

[00:17:21] Like I wonder if if the generation of say our daughters are going to be just

[00:17:27] less less sucked into trolling because it's such an it's just a part of Internet culture.

[00:17:34] Yeah, I think so.

[00:17:35] I think they'll just be more mature about it.

[00:17:37] Like we're in this sweet spot and maybe the worst are people who are

[00:17:43] one generate like early thirties or something like that where,

[00:17:46] you know, they're they still really care about how they're perceived.

[00:17:52] And so a troll can really do damage on those people, especially on social media

[00:17:58] and stuff like that.

[00:17:59] Oh, that's interesting.

[00:18:00] I, you know, I I feel like I'm improved.

[00:18:04] But what I've improved is my behavior, not not my gut reaction.

[00:18:09] Right.

[00:18:09] And so it takes.

[00:18:12] It takes some real suppression on my part.

[00:18:14] And we had someone on Reddit that we didn't know.

[00:18:17] Like I honestly didn't know if it was.

[00:18:20] Yeah, yeah.

[00:18:20] Remember that post?

[00:18:21] Yeah, you're like, wait, are you trolling?

[00:18:25] I was like 50 50 on that.

[00:18:29] Yeah, no, it wasn't clear.

[00:18:30] I'm sure that this will list a response where they say I wasn't trolling,

[00:18:33] but that still won't be evidence.

[00:18:35] No, that's exactly what a troll would do.

[00:18:38] Yeah, I think I concluded that they weren't.

[00:18:41] But but if they if they are their expert,

[00:18:44] they're they're trolling it like a, you know, graduate school level.

[00:18:48] But but there's a there's like expert like Ken M.

[00:18:51] Where it's a force for good.

[00:18:53] Yeah, I don't know that Ken M is a force for good.

[00:18:55] He's like a chaotic, neutral kind of, you know, I don't know what good

[00:18:59] he's doing other than giving us laughter.

[00:19:02] That's a good.

[00:19:02] But that's it.

[00:19:03] That's that might be it.

[00:19:04] Yeah.

[00:19:05] The world needs laughter.

[00:19:09] It's kind of like good innocent fun.

[00:19:12] Ken M.

[00:19:12] Yeah, except for the prison replying.

[00:19:16] I wonder how many of the people who respond realize afterwards.

[00:19:19] Like, oh, shit, I got trolled.

[00:19:21] Yeah, then you tip your hat if Ken M had got me, I would just be.

[00:19:25] Yeah, nice.

[00:19:27] You know, it's like getting punked or something.

[00:19:29] Yeah, yeah, that's how that's how you should react.

[00:19:32] Can we talk about this question of.

[00:19:35] Art and can art troll because my first thought was yes.

[00:19:39] And I might have even been willing to say that Lynch was trolling

[00:19:46] his audience a little bit, although in a good way.

[00:19:49] But now I'm starting to think no.

[00:19:51] Yeah, an artist control.

[00:19:54] I don't know that the artist could troll via the art.

[00:19:59] Right.

[00:19:59] Like so so Lynch could could sort of quaw artists

[00:20:03] to get on the internet and say something about like,

[00:20:06] hey, what you guys don't know is that Laura Palmer was alive the whole time.

[00:20:10] But if he did that in an actual show, I'd be like, well.

[00:20:15] That's our artwork now. Exactly.

[00:20:17] Yeah. Yeah.

[00:20:20] Yeah, so I think what the person meant, and I'll say this

[00:20:22] without trying to spoil anything, but there were certain beloved characters

[00:20:26] and that were seemed like they were being deliberately withheld.

[00:20:30] You know, it was like deliberately withholding fan service

[00:20:34] in a way.

[00:20:35] But that again, that whole season was about nostalgia

[00:20:40] and wanting to go back to the past.

[00:20:43] I think that's just part of the art.

[00:20:45] It's not trolling in that case.

[00:20:47] And it's also just David Lynch.

[00:20:49] Like that's just what he does.

[00:20:51] They made this point on Diane, but David Lynch never gives you what you expect.

[00:20:55] And that's just how he that's just what makes David Lynch David Lynch.

[00:21:00] It's not trolling.

[00:21:02] It's just and I doubt that, you know, when you say it's insincere,

[00:21:05] it's very sincere.

[00:21:06] Right. Well, so there are two questions.

[00:21:09] One, it was David Lynch trolling and the other is Ken and Art is troll.

[00:21:14] And what would it take to troll the audience?

[00:21:17] So here's an example, maybe.

[00:21:19] I mean, I don't nobody would do this.

[00:21:21] But what if you remade Ghostbusters but have had all of them be women?

[00:21:26] Would that be troll? No, no one would do that.

[00:21:30] Plus, who would get mad at that?

[00:21:31] Why would anybody get mad?

[00:21:34] I mean, I think it's possible.

[00:21:37] I mean, we could troll our audience

[00:21:38] suppose that we did a really sincere sounding show where like you were arguing

[00:21:42] that there was no gender bias and play diets.

[00:21:45] Like I feel.

[00:21:50] See, we're not being sincere.

[00:21:54] No, but I mean, but in all seriousness,

[00:21:56] I think we could troll our audience if we put out an episode.

[00:22:00] I mean, we're not artists.

[00:22:02] I mean, like we might like to think of this as art, but it's not.

[00:22:06] Definitely art.

[00:22:08] Just saying it's art is trolling our audience.

[00:22:10] I'll make a really trolly beat for this episode.

[00:22:14] Well, is Tarantino does Tarantino troll his audience sometimes?

[00:22:19] Oh, yeah, you were saying that about his his his character,

[00:22:22] which we got some comments on the use of the use of Dan Word in Pulp Fiction

[00:22:26] by by the tarantino.

[00:22:28] It's not really part of his art.

[00:22:30] I think the word provocative as you used it

[00:22:33] is the one that really gives me pause about like, I mean, it indicates sincerity.

[00:22:38] I think that but it might not indicate sincerity.

[00:22:40] It might indicate a cash grab like attention grab.

[00:22:44] But I think that in the purpose of getting attention and like,

[00:22:48] you know, views and clicks and all that, if that's the purpose,

[00:22:53] then maybe that's not troll like I really feel like trolling

[00:22:56] has to be this chaotic action.

[00:22:58] It's funny also, like I think it was a different time then.

[00:23:01] And that was even though it was fairly shocking.

[00:23:05] If Tarantino did that now, I would be more inclined to say

[00:23:11] that it was but, you know, like reservoir dogs had white people

[00:23:14] saying the N word too.

[00:23:16] And like there's something about Tarantino himself

[00:23:20] putting himself in the movie that seems as especially.

[00:23:23] Yeah.

[00:23:24] Yeah. Yeah. Maybe. I don't know.

[00:23:26] All right. Well, that was.

[00:23:28] There's a much longer discussion on trolling than I think

[00:23:31] I thought we could ever have. Yeah.

[00:23:32] All right. We'll be right back to talk about Big Lebowski.

[00:23:37] Lebowski.

[00:23:39] You want the money?

[00:23:41] Lebowski.

[00:23:45] That is accurate pronunciation.

[00:23:46] I don't care what anybody says.

[00:24:18] See if there's a black man.

[00:24:20] See if there's a black man.

[00:24:49] Welcome back to very bad wizards.

[00:24:52] This is the time of the show where we like to take a moment

[00:24:55] and thank our audience.

[00:24:57] I think we have a very tiny percentage of trolls among our audience,

[00:25:01] if any.

[00:25:04] To troll to sincerity ratio is great.

[00:25:06] It's just awesome.

[00:25:07] And we love when you get in touch with us.

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[00:26:42] It's really or you can donate us.

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[00:27:11] and all of the other forms of support.

[00:27:13] Yeah, thank you guys.

[00:27:15] So the Big Lebowski, I think this movie is

[00:27:20] it's the most rewatchable movie of all time.

[00:27:23] I already know that there will never be a time

[00:27:26] where I won't want to see it anymore.

[00:27:29] It's just so fun to have these characters in your life for a couple of hours.

[00:27:33] That's and every one of them, like I think every performance is awesome.

[00:27:39] There's no bad performances in this movie.

[00:27:41] There is there's no blueberry pie girl in the Big Lebowski.

[00:27:47] You know, there's nobody like that who you want to hit the fast forward button.

[00:27:51] You might want to hit the fast forward button a couple of times in the

[00:27:53] Lebowski, but not because of a performance or a character.

[00:27:56] Would you disagree with that?

[00:27:58] I'm trying to think, you know,

[00:28:01] I don't care for Julianne Moore for her for her character.

[00:28:07] I think that I would say that's the weakest, but I think you're right.

[00:28:09] There's no bad performance.

[00:28:10] I mean, I think that's just a matter of my taste.

[00:28:12] Like the one thing that I fast forward is the the musical interludes.

[00:28:20] Even the second one where his dream sequences.

[00:28:25] So the one where he's flying like Superman,

[00:28:27] and you still shouldn't fast forward through it.

[00:28:30] But the other one is like kind of a central

[00:28:33] like all the themes coalescing in a dream.

[00:28:35] Yeah, yeah. I think I just have low tolerance for when when

[00:28:40] music becomes central.

[00:28:41] Julianne Moore grew on me and I took maybe like a few times.

[00:28:46] At first I didn't.

[00:28:48] I had the same kind of reaction.

[00:28:49] She seems almost like a caricatured, stereotypical, humorless feminist.

[00:28:56] But she's actually, yeah, I mean, I've grown to like that character

[00:28:59] and appreciate her performance and also the character herself.

[00:29:03] They have great they have great banter.

[00:29:05] Those two. Yeah, I mean, she's supposed to be annoying in that particular way,

[00:29:08] even though she actually is very the dialogue that she's giving is very funny.

[00:29:13] She's not laughing, but she's funny.

[00:29:15] And I also think it has two utterly iconic characters,

[00:29:21] the dude and Walter.

[00:29:24] Walter might be the funniest character ever written.

[00:29:27] I mean, there's almost nothing that comes out of his mouth

[00:29:29] that isn't just so funny.

[00:29:32] And delivered with such sincerity and conviction.

[00:29:37] It's just it's a perfect use of John Goodman.

[00:29:42] I I think John Goodman is one of the most underrated actors.

[00:29:45] You know, he's he's almost exclusively used in the supporting actor role.

[00:29:51] But when he is man, does he fucking deliver?

[00:29:54] Yeah, he's so good at this.

[00:29:56] He's so good.

[00:29:59] And just like, yeah, just the anger and the indignation that he brings to things

[00:30:05] that just don't involve him, that are none of his business that are.

[00:30:09] But he I mean, it's like I'm going to make the case that he is

[00:30:13] the ultimate deontologist, like he really at least his rhetoric.

[00:30:19] But I think also he believes it.

[00:30:21] We need to follow rules.

[00:30:23] I mean, he says that when he almost shoots smokey.

[00:30:26] What does he say?

[00:30:27] Am I the only person that believes in rules anymore?

[00:30:30] He went over the line.

[00:30:31] You got like, that's a zero.

[00:30:33] Like that's that's a principle.

[00:30:34] Like when he's at the coffee shop and they're asking him to stop like

[00:30:38] screaming out profanity in like the middle of the afternoon at this family

[00:30:43] diner and he's like first he brings out the First Amendment and the Supreme

[00:30:46] Court has roundly rejected prior restraint as a condition.

[00:30:50] Like he's very much abandoned, you know, keeping kosher.

[00:30:54] I can't I can't bowl on Shabbos.

[00:30:56] I can't drive on Shabbos.

[00:30:57] I'm shoma fucking Shabbos.

[00:30:59] Like this is like there are these guiding principles that rule his life,

[00:31:04] even though they're there by accident, the kosher rules.

[00:31:07] Like those are just he's not he didn't wasn't born Jewish.

[00:31:11] He converted and his wife divorced him and he's still doing.

[00:31:14] He's still going to the same synagogue.

[00:31:16] He's still so.

[00:31:17] So I'll defend my view that he's far from a deontologist when I when

[00:31:21] I talk about my scenes, but but all I say now is.

[00:31:27] Just because he follows some rules doesn't make him a deontologist.

[00:31:30] No, he's committed to rules as the guiding moral principle or worshiper of rules.

[00:31:36] But he is so haphazard in their application that I wouldn't call it

[00:31:40] principle based at all.

[00:31:42] Like, you know, but he he believes out the First Amendment

[00:31:47] because he wants to talk, not because he believes in the First Amendment.

[00:31:51] Well, I'm not saying that the but so OK.

[00:31:55] Right. When I say he's a deontologist,

[00:31:58] he thinks like a Kantian, as long as you follow the rules, you're not wrong.

[00:32:03] You might be an asshole, but you're not wrong.

[00:32:07] And he's constantly asking, am I wrong? Am I wrong?

[00:32:10] Right. Like and and and so as long as he doesn't violate

[00:32:15] the whatever imperatives, the principles, I'm not saying that they're not,

[00:32:19] you know, post hoc to do a large degree.

[00:32:23] But he does seem to believe that that where like the dude is like, yeah,

[00:32:28] but you're still an asshole smoke who gives a fuck if he went two inches over

[00:32:33] the line? Like that's not his.

[00:32:36] That's not the way he is obsessed with rules.

[00:32:40] Like we'll leave it and leave it all agree with you there.

[00:32:43] Yeah. So I love it for that.

[00:32:45] I love it just because you can have it on constantly.

[00:32:50] It's like a friend when you're traveling.

[00:32:52] It is a it has a and it's got heart.

[00:32:55] And, you know, I don't know, like what do you think of Cohen,

[00:32:57] the Cohen brothers in general?

[00:33:00] I really like them.

[00:33:01] I it's interesting that you say that you think it's got heart

[00:33:04] because, you know, and I'll probably take a harder stance here.

[00:33:08] I love the movie.

[00:33:09] I'll probably take a harder stance for the sake of argument.

[00:33:11] But I think.

[00:33:13] It exactly doesn't have heart.

[00:33:16] I think it's it's lacking that.

[00:33:18] I think it's it's of course, I love the Cohen brothers.

[00:33:21] They take absurdity to to this to me is like.

[00:33:27] It's Kafka ask.

[00:33:29] It's it's a reflection on the absurdity and meaninglessness of life.

[00:33:35] And I think it's wonderful as that.

[00:33:37] And I think a lot of Cohen brothers movies are like you thought

[00:33:40] you thought there was meaning, but there's not, you know.

[00:33:43] I think this is one of the ultimate displays of that kind of nihilism.

[00:33:47] It I think it's a kind of nihilist movie.

[00:33:49] So this is what my thoughts were that.

[00:33:53] There is that there is an active shaping of meaning by the pulp fiction characters

[00:33:59] and they're imposing this deeper meaning onto everything here in in.

[00:34:04] The big Lebowski, I think there is it's all absurd.

[00:34:08] There is the the person who tries the hardest to impose meaning on everything

[00:34:14] is Walter. Yeah, he's trying and he is a buffoon.

[00:34:17] He fucks everything up that he's trying to.

[00:34:19] Yeah, he's he's a buffoon.

[00:34:20] And I think that what one of the things they're saying is like,

[00:34:23] you know, don't try like that.

[00:34:24] You can't you can't find a deep meaning in this shit that's going on.

[00:34:29] Like he's he's searching.

[00:34:31] Walter is searching for a system of meaning.

[00:34:34] He's searching for a moral code.

[00:34:36] He's searching, you know, he's he's embracing religion.

[00:34:41] He's embracing these these rules, as you say.

[00:34:43] And I think he's doing a haphazard job at it and he becomes sort of a character

[00:34:48] to be mocked, you know.

[00:34:51] But also one you feel affection for just because of his.

[00:34:55] You love Walter. Don't get it wrong.

[00:34:57] Yeah, I love I think he is one of the great characters of all time.

[00:35:00] But I think that he is, you know, the the buffoon in the thematic sense

[00:35:05] where he's, you know, he and there is a moment.

[00:35:09] And well, maybe I'll save it for our discussion.

[00:35:11] I think there's there's a moment where there's a nice.

[00:35:14] Brace note. There's a nice resolution of this.

[00:35:17] But but the dude on the other hand is

[00:35:22] he's not trying to find me at all.

[00:35:25] That's why shit is like water.

[00:35:27] He's water, you know, what's the ultimate.

[00:35:30] So I mean, I get that interpretation.

[00:35:35] The reason I said it's it's kind of heartwarming or it's got heart

[00:35:38] compared to a lot of their movies is that I think like the dude's character

[00:35:44] is stands for something in in that he is

[00:35:51] will just get carried off with events and will roll with them

[00:35:55] in this very kind of Taoist zen like way.

[00:35:58] He's not trying to change things.

[00:36:01] He is just trying to play the hand that he's dealt

[00:36:05] and enjoy it as much as possible.

[00:36:07] And the sense you get of the Coen brothers in terms of like an ethic

[00:36:13] and ethos that they would approve of is the dude's ethos.

[00:36:20] You know, he is somebody that will

[00:36:24] not try to interfere too much with the world.

[00:36:28] That's a kind of ethic that that's a kind of now it's very

[00:36:34] it is not necessarily something that you think will be great for society

[00:36:39] or that you wish on your children or something like that.

[00:36:44] But it's a kind of ethic that has a, you know,

[00:36:48] like that's why I think people have such deep affection for him.

[00:36:51] Some people want to model their life after them, which I think is a mistake.

[00:36:55] But the fact that that even exists, you know, I think shows that there

[00:37:01] there is some meaningfulness to what he's to the

[00:37:05] the way in which he just approaches the world and his and experience.

[00:37:11] Right. I mean, I think that in a meta sense,

[00:37:13] like the ability to not to not become wrapped up in things

[00:37:21] like he would never care about the Gold Watch like that.

[00:37:25] It, you know, he kind of cares about the carpet.

[00:37:28] I'm interested about the rug.

[00:37:29] I'm interested. I'm interested to know what what your interpretation is

[00:37:32] about why he cares about the rug ties the room together.

[00:37:36] Well, that's true.

[00:37:38] No one can argue with that.

[00:37:39] But he is, I think, created as somebody who is not going to take part.

[00:37:48] You know, he's maybe it's

[00:37:50] maybe it just depends on your views of what detachment really is.

[00:37:55] And and I think that what can be said with certainty is that he

[00:38:00] does not care to be involved.

[00:38:02] Yeah. And he used to be, you know, he talks about being part of the Seattle Seven.

[00:38:05] Yeah. Turns out six other guys.

[00:38:10] And you get the sense that he stopped trying.

[00:38:12] Yeah. Yeah.

[00:38:14] And in that sense makes him a man of his time, like because that's sort

[00:38:18] of what people were doing.

[00:38:21] And in that point, they had stopped trying the like the level of activism was not

[00:38:25] very high, the level of, you know, not compared to the seventies or late

[00:38:30] sixties when he went to college and when he was occupying various administration

[00:38:35] buildings and.

[00:38:37] Right. Right.

[00:38:39] Right. So so I think that you could champion him as somebody who is

[00:38:45] living a life that that you might want to lead that of sort of detachment

[00:38:50] from all of the mundane things and the big Lebowski, you know, the old man

[00:38:55] is the opposite in that sense.

[00:38:57] He is cares about nothing more than the things of this world.

[00:39:01] Yeah. You know.

[00:39:02] But he he's a fraud, right?

[00:39:04] That that's the one thing about the dude is he is in no way a fraud.

[00:39:09] He is authentically who he is in a way that no other character in that movie is.

[00:39:15] Yeah. Well, and I think that that the Coen brothers are saying, look,

[00:39:19] the people who are trying so hard are kind of idiots for trying so hard.

[00:39:23] Yeah, I think that that the dude is clearly the champion of the movie,

[00:39:28] although the dude is somebody who just has things happen to him.

[00:39:32] Yeah. Well, I mean, so I.

[00:39:35] You know, you think of some of these people who are trying too hard

[00:39:39] and obviously the Lebowski, the Jeffrey Lebowski, the big Lebowski

[00:39:44] is definitely fraudulent, unsympathetic in that he is trying to present

[00:39:50] himself as something he's not.

[00:39:52] Some of the other characters, I don't think they're mocking relentlessly

[00:39:58] like Maude, even though Maude is trying to have this affectation.

[00:40:03] They clearly they have affection for that character

[00:40:06] and what she's trying to do and what she believes in,

[00:40:10] even like the little private detective that's following him in the BW bug.

[00:40:17] It's like, I'm a shameless.

[00:40:18] Some of a private dick like he like he's not like he's trying

[00:40:24] and like the landlord, he's trying like he's trying to bring out some part of him.

[00:40:28] And I think they have affection for that, too.

[00:40:30] That's not the dude, but they have affection for these people

[00:40:34] who are stretching a little bit, who are trying to as long as they're

[00:40:37] not hurting other people in the process.

[00:40:39] Yeah, you're right.

[00:40:40] They have affection for those characters in a way.

[00:40:44] And they even have affection for Walter.

[00:40:46] I think it's just that within the confines of the movie

[00:40:49] that those aren't the people with Maude, isn't it?

[00:40:51] I mean, I was thinking about that.

[00:40:52] I don't know where Maude fits in here because on the one hand

[00:40:59] she seems principled in some way.

[00:41:01] But on the other hand, there is a scene where she's

[00:41:03] with her artist friend with a shitty mustache.

[00:41:06] David Thule.

[00:41:07] Yeah, they're just laughing at everything.

[00:41:09] And I think there's something in that scene of laughter

[00:41:12] that is the ultimate way in which they're dealing with a world.

[00:41:16] Just laugh at this shit, you know?

[00:41:19] Yeah, I saw that as just him walking into some pretentious

[00:41:24] like modern art community and just the way they I don't know.

[00:41:28] Like, yeah, no, it was definitely like a like modern artists.

[00:41:32] By the way, that actor is awesome.

[00:41:35] And he was he was also in a movie of that period,

[00:41:37] like right around that period called Naked.

[00:41:40] He was the star of that.

[00:41:41] That's incredible.

[00:41:42] And then OK, so you want to get a bit?

[00:41:45] Yeah, no, I was going to say Amy Mann is the nihilist

[00:41:49] girlfriend who got her toe cut off.

[00:41:51] I hadn't noticed it until this time.

[00:41:53] I was like, oh, shit, that's Amy Mann when she orders at the diner.

[00:41:59] And they don't know they can't understand her.

[00:42:02] And then the other guy says, Bingo Berry pancake.

[00:42:06] Aufwachen Arschlauch.

[00:42:08] Lincoln by a pancake.

[00:42:13] Steppix and blankets.

[00:42:16] To me, I can't be a false cooking.

[00:42:19] I can't be a false cooking.

[00:42:21] She has lingonberry pancakes.

[00:42:23] Oh man, when I'm a fan, I think.

[00:42:24] Yeah, yeah, what is that made?

[00:42:26] It's just better.

[00:42:26] There's the good butter on it.

[00:42:27] It's a shit.

[00:42:28] That's not so good.

[00:42:29] It's like a cup.

[00:42:30] It's a shit.

[00:42:33] Steppix and blankets.

[00:42:35] I would love to nail down their accent.

[00:42:38] I'm not good at accent in general, but there's something that's just so funny

[00:42:42] about the nihilist.

[00:42:44] The fucking nihilists.

[00:42:46] We won the money.

[00:42:48] The Bosque.

[00:42:49] I can't do it.

[00:42:50] The Bosque.

[00:42:52] It's not exactly.

[00:42:53] It's like it's not full on German either.

[00:42:55] It's some weird perversion of a German accent.

[00:43:00] People trying to get the German accent.

[00:43:03] All right.

[00:43:04] Sure.

[00:43:04] We talk about the scenes.

[00:43:05] Yeah.

[00:43:06] So one of the things that I like about this movie is

[00:43:13] people are constantly getting things a little bit wrong.

[00:43:15] Yeah.

[00:43:16] You know, it's just like a theme in there.

[00:43:18] Like everyone's getting a little, you know, one of the

[00:43:22] most delightful things upon rewatching the movie

[00:43:26] is when you notice that the dude is just repeating everything

[00:43:31] yeah that people say before him.

[00:43:33] Like he's kind of a blank slate.

[00:43:34] You know, he's like a leaf blowing in the wind.

[00:43:38] But even his dialogue just flows through him.

[00:43:41] Like what he hears then will just come out later on at it.

[00:43:47] And you're like, I don't know if this is in the service of

[00:43:49] a larger theme, but they're just trying to say he's a

[00:43:51] pothead.

[00:43:52] No, I mean, it is.

[00:43:53] I think that's his personality.

[00:43:55] Like he like what comes into him like will go out of him

[00:44:00] in the right time when there's the right flow.

[00:44:05] So so I think that that to me, one of my favorite scenes

[00:44:09] that captures the what I think is an underlying nihilism

[00:44:12] about the movie or at least a don't don't attempt to find

[00:44:16] meaning in things is when he's at Jackie Tree Horan's house.

[00:44:22] Yeah.

[00:44:23] And he sees him take a phone call

[00:44:26] and sketch something down on a notepad.

[00:44:29] And for a second there, just for a second,

[00:44:32] you see the dude all of a sudden be like,

[00:44:36] now I'm going to do something about this.

[00:44:37] I'm going to be a private detective for like, yeah,

[00:44:40] like I don't know what changes in his character at that moment.

[00:44:42] And so he goes to the notepad where Jackie Tree Horan has

[00:44:46] has ripped off the note that he was writing.

[00:44:48] And he does that trick that, you know, that you learn

[00:44:51] when you're a kid of shading the paper to see what was

[00:44:54] written on the top paper because of the indentation will

[00:44:57] still come out.

[00:44:58] And it's just a dick.

[00:44:59] Yeah.

[00:44:59] Right. And and there is something in that scene

[00:45:02] that to me captures what this movie is about.

[00:45:04] It's like you want, I know you want it to be about something.

[00:45:07] I know you want this to be a mystery that's like

[00:45:10] wonderful and that you're going to solve in like

[00:45:12] this traditional structure of a story or a mystery.

[00:45:15] But now it's all just a dick.

[00:45:17] In fact, it's just like cock and balls.

[00:45:20] Yeah. I love that.

[00:45:21] Or like an erect.

[00:45:26] Yeah, no, I mean, it is interesting.

[00:45:28] It's it's almost out of it's out of character that he

[00:45:31] would do that in a certain way.

[00:45:33] I think as the events go along, he starts to gain

[00:45:37] a little more confidence in his ability to figure things out.

[00:45:42] At first, he has a kind of humility about it

[00:45:44] and it's Walter that's already.

[00:45:46] But then he starts to think, oh, wait, I'm starting

[00:45:48] everything's kind of falling into place.

[00:45:50] And that's the you know, that's one of the culminations of that.

[00:45:53] And then to the extent that he has an arc at all,

[00:45:56] it's him realizing, OK, no, I don't like

[00:46:02] I shouldn't have even thought for a second.

[00:46:04] I could figure out what's going on because I know that the

[00:46:08] role I get this sense that he he's just like if only I had just

[00:46:12] not cared about that rug.

[00:46:14] I think that's that's the rug is is less a MacGuffin and more

[00:46:20] like this is where the movie begins.

[00:46:23] It's when he started to care about something

[00:46:25] and everything went downhill when he started to care about that rug.

[00:46:28] Yeah, I mean, I don't know if he ever shows regret for caring

[00:46:31] about the rug. It's tied the room together like it's as much of a

[00:46:36] meaning as he's going to have in his life.

[00:46:40] Like there's bowling and there's the rug.

[00:46:42] He doesn't want to have a family.

[00:46:44] He's completely detached in any, you know, from any kind of moral cause.

[00:46:50] So the rug, you don't think that he that he is

[00:46:55] doesn't want to be in these situations?

[00:46:58] Yeah, but I think that he I definitely think he doesn't.

[00:47:01] But I don't think he regrets the rug because he keeps kind of

[00:47:06] chasing after the rug and no, I so it's not that I think that he didn't care

[00:47:10] about the rug. I think it's just that the moment that he invests

[00:47:13] in an attachment is when things go downhill.

[00:47:16] And at some point doesn't he say, you know, I could have just had

[00:47:20] a soiled rug or whatever like I just could have a peed on rock like that.

[00:47:24] So my first scene is the opening in the supermarket with Sam

[00:47:31] Elliott's voiceover.

[00:47:32] And I just think it does a great job of setting the like the themes

[00:47:37] of the movie just right out there.

[00:47:40] It's not it's not a secret that this is a movie about masculinity,

[00:47:45] deconstructing it, subverting all of our expectations about it.

[00:47:50] And, you know, he just says straight out like sometimes there's a man.

[00:47:56] I won't say a hero because what's a hero and his voice is just so great.

[00:48:00] That's one of the all time voices.

[00:48:03] See, I mean, amazing.

[00:48:05] And he says sometimes there's a man.

[00:48:07] Well, he's the man for his time is placed.

[00:48:09] And even this movie is all about interruptions, corrections,

[00:48:14] people being corrected, people even Sam Elliott in this opening

[00:48:18] just kind of like gets lost in what he's trying to say.

[00:48:21] He is exactly and exactly.

[00:48:24] He's like, it's like just from the get go.

[00:48:26] They're like, yeah, this is look, this is going to be about this wonderful story.

[00:48:30] And then he just loses his train of thought.

[00:48:31] And what? No.

[00:48:32] And then he's like, all right.

[00:48:33] And it's like you said, like I shouldn't have tried to get too deep here.

[00:48:37] Like I was I was saying sometimes there's a man that just, you know,

[00:48:41] he's saying he represents his time in place.

[00:48:43] Los Angeles in the early 90s.

[00:48:45] But, you know, then he just starts getting lost in it,

[00:48:48] just trying to get too deep about it.

[00:48:51] And he's like, I'll just tell you the story and stop rambling like that.

[00:48:55] But it really is.

[00:48:57] And it has the first moment of what you're talking about.

[00:49:01] You see George W.

[00:49:03] George H.W. Bush talking about invading Iraq again in 1990,

[00:49:09] 1990, actually, right?

[00:49:11] Ninety one.

[00:49:14] Yeah.

[00:49:14] Ninety one.

[00:49:15] Ninety one.

[00:49:16] Yeah.

[00:49:17] This aggression will not stand.

[00:49:20] This aggression to Kuwait will not stand.

[00:49:22] And then that will then come up in his first meeting with Lebowski.

[00:49:27] This aggression will not stand, man.

[00:49:30] You know, it's just like that just can't.

[00:49:33] It's just so funny that that would come from George

[00:49:37] Herbert Walker Bush.

[00:49:38] Yeah.

[00:49:39] That that's his dial.

[00:49:41] That's what informs his dialogue with Lebowski.

[00:49:45] It's just so great.

[00:49:46] And it really is just this is a movie about what it means to be a man.

[00:49:51] They say that over and over again, the scene, the second scene with the big

[00:49:55] Lebowski where he just says, what makes a man, Mr.

[00:49:59] Lebowski, you know, like this is about that question.

[00:50:02] What makes a man in this day and age?

[00:50:04] There's no war.

[00:50:05] People are being detached.

[00:50:07] Nobody seems to have a family in this movie, except I guess

[00:50:11] the Lebowski and Maude, but they're completely alienated from each other.

[00:50:15] I interpret the what is it?

[00:50:17] What does it mean to be a man as less about masculinity and more

[00:50:21] about like what does it take to to to be a responsible adult human being?

[00:50:26] I agree. Obviously there's an unavoidable discussion of I mean,

[00:50:31] there's I can't I can't say that it's not about masculinity because

[00:50:34] the Walter's violence and his his desire to to to be an authority, all that.

[00:50:41] I think you're right about the masculinity, but I don't.

[00:50:45] I don't know.

[00:50:46] I don't know whether that discussion about what does it mean to be a man

[00:50:49] is about masculinity per se and not just about like, well,

[00:50:53] what does it mean to be a responsible grown human being in society?

[00:50:57] I got to contribute.

[00:50:58] I disagree with this very strongly.

[00:51:02] So I think when he's having the discussion with the Lebowski at the beginning,

[00:51:06] the two Lebaskis about like what like get a job, do what your parents do.

[00:51:10] And I overcame in my the Chinaman thing is another thing

[00:51:15] that's a recall from the earlier.

[00:51:18] They took my legs, but I persevered.

[00:51:21] That's about like what a man is supposed to do.

[00:51:23] And a man has this trophy wife that he gives an allowance to.

[00:51:28] And then that's completely turned on his head where it's actually

[00:51:31] his daughter that's giving him an allowance.

[00:51:33] And Walter is always talking about like being, you know,

[00:51:37] his buddies face down in the muck in NAMM, but he's taking care of his ex-wife's

[00:51:43] Pomeranian and when she goes with her new husband or lover to Hawaii,

[00:51:50] like all these things about like what what defines a man just seems like

[00:51:58] they're just getting completely subverted and turned around.

[00:52:02] You know, once you realize that the Lebowski actually has no money,

[00:52:06] he has no like job that he's done.

[00:52:09] He's he's been given this job to keep him busy like like he's some kid.

[00:52:14] These people are boys and not men and there's no way for them

[00:52:20] or they don't know how to be a man.

[00:52:21] And maybe there's no way unless you're going to be the dude.

[00:52:25] I yeah, I think there's there's

[00:52:29] I think even just the whole threat of getting your penis chopped off

[00:52:34] is consistent with that. Right? Yes.

[00:52:37] And so it's not so much that I disagree.

[00:52:39] I just don't know.

[00:52:40] It's like Pulp Fiction being about redemption.

[00:52:43] Well, like I know that that's like the substance of a lot of the movie.

[00:52:45] But but I feel like there's no.

[00:52:49] There's there's the deeper layer of like the meaninglessness,

[00:52:51] but in part because I don't know that anybody ever is an example of what it

[00:52:56] I don't see the movie as contributing to that question other than just saying like,

[00:53:01] you know, these are a bunch of people who are not really.

[00:53:03] So OK, I'm ready for my second scene.

[00:53:05] This scene is probably an obvious pick,

[00:53:08] but it's the scene where they're scattering Donnie's ashes.

[00:53:13] And I it's it's the most weirdly touching,

[00:53:18] funny and sad scene, I think of the movie.

[00:53:23] And the reason I mean, aside from the fact that it sort of pulls my heart strings,

[00:53:27] I nobody wanted Donnie to die.

[00:53:30] No, no.

[00:53:33] We just wanted him to shut the fuck up.

[00:53:35] That's all we wanted.

[00:53:37] He's out of his element.

[00:53:38] He's out of his.

[00:53:41] And the ashes.

[00:53:42] So so Walter is is, you know, giving his

[00:53:46] his little funeral speech and in in line with his character, as we've described him,

[00:53:53] he just starts rambling about like soldiers who who died in Vietnam.

[00:53:58] And I actually have the quote.

[00:54:00] Yeah, yeah. He died like so many young men of his generation.

[00:54:04] He died before his time.

[00:54:06] In your wisdom, Lord, you took him as you took so many

[00:54:10] bright, flowering young men at Kason, at Long Dock, at Hill 364.

[00:54:16] These young men gave their lives and so

[00:54:20] would Donnie Donnie who loved bowling.

[00:54:25] And and this is one of the points where

[00:54:28] so there's two things that happen

[00:54:30] and that that that I really like.

[00:54:33] One is the dude just calls him on it.

[00:54:36] He's like, come like stop it.

[00:54:38] Like this is after the ashes is blown.

[00:54:40] This after the ashes.

[00:54:42] They have Donnie's ashes in a coffee can

[00:54:45] because they didn't want to pay for the overpriced urns, which,

[00:54:49] you know, I don't blame them.

[00:54:50] The death industry is ridiculous.

[00:54:53] This is our most modestly, modestly priced receptacle.

[00:55:00] And and the dude just finally just loses loses it a little bit

[00:55:05] with Walter and he calls him out on it.

[00:55:07] And Walter has this what I think is a super sincere.

[00:55:10] Yeah, I'm sorry, dude.

[00:55:12] Like, yeah, he actually apologized.

[00:55:14] He realizes it.

[00:55:15] And and I feel like Walter is having a moment where at least

[00:55:20] in the way that I've been seeing the movie, you know, Walter is this

[00:55:23] dude who's who's creating or leaning on these sources of meaning

[00:55:28] that are really just kind of ridiculous and meaningless

[00:55:32] that he shouldn't be relying on anymore.

[00:55:34] And I feel like in that moment and the meaninglessness of Donnie's death

[00:55:40] and being called out by the dude, which seriously, if the dude calls you out,

[00:55:44] you probably really are in the wrong at this point.

[00:55:49] That he he seems to me to come to face with the actual meaninglessness

[00:55:53] that that it's lifted the veil.

[00:55:57] And he's it's a raw moment.

[00:56:00] I don't know.

[00:56:00] It feels like it's a it's a coming to terms with.

[00:56:03] And I think he'll go right back to being old Walter.

[00:56:06] But I think in that moment, he has some clarity about

[00:56:09] this stop with the bullshit.

[00:56:11] It is a moment of clarity for him.

[00:56:13] I think you can see it.

[00:56:14] He's such he's so good in this performance.

[00:56:16] You can see it in his body like he's always so tightly wound.

[00:56:21] And then when he hugs the dude,

[00:56:25] he just kind of slumps a little bit into his arms.

[00:56:29] And I think so that his body language also reflects this acceptance that,

[00:56:36] you know, and I agree he's going to probably go back.

[00:56:38] But this acceptance that it is actually time to move on from

[00:56:43] from Vietnam and stop using it as an excuse for every one of your weird

[00:56:49] obsessions, but even the last line of it, right?

[00:56:52] He says, fuck it, let's go bowling.

[00:56:54] You know, yeah, it's like it means it's something,

[00:56:57] I think that in a lot of great movies and TV shows,

[00:57:02] at least the ones that I like, there is

[00:57:05] a truth to people's inability to really, truly change or step out of who they are.

[00:57:11] You see this in The Sopranos a lot and probably talked about it where

[00:57:14] where something happens to rattle you and you feel like you have this sobering

[00:57:18] moment of clarity, but then you just go right back to to the person you are

[00:57:22] because you know what?

[00:57:23] It's too hard to you can't dwell on the meaningless

[00:57:26] ness of life or the futility of everything that you're doing or believe in.

[00:57:30] You can't dwell on that for that long.

[00:57:32] You have to just continue living.

[00:57:34] I don't think his moment of clarity is Samuel Jackson's character would call it

[00:57:40] is that life is meaningless.

[00:57:43] I think it is something much more specific about Walter

[00:57:47] that he has imbued

[00:57:52] everything he's doing now with the meaning of Vietnam and

[00:57:58] and the Shabbat.

[00:58:00] Yeah, but like a right and Shabbat like he's he's realized that the things

[00:58:06] that he professes to care about actually aren't relevant to the situation

[00:58:13] that he is.

[00:58:14] But but but it's not life is meaningless at that point.

[00:58:18] I don't think it's not a kind of a nihilism.

[00:58:21] It's it's something very much more personal to him.

[00:58:25] Yeah, I feel it's right to clarify it because I don't mean that he's all of a sudden

[00:58:30] become, you know, the sycophous pushing a rock and pondering.

[00:58:35] But I do mean that those systems that he's that he leans on

[00:58:41] to, you know, that are total defenses, they're they they're

[00:58:45] they can't wrap him up as a blanket today. Right.

[00:58:47] They're not they're not working today.

[00:58:49] Today, today you're faced with like the harsh reality that, you know what?

[00:58:54] Doesn't Donnie's dead and you need it.

[00:58:57] And maybe here is where where I'll walk back a little bit.

[00:59:02] My my insistence that this isn't exactly about masculinity,

[00:59:07] because there is something about the hug that that is just a reminder

[00:59:13] that, you know, for all of the attempts at being hyper masculine

[00:59:18] that Walter displays, he does need that hug in that moment.

[00:59:24] It really is you're right.

[00:59:25] It's a sincere moment of hugging and it's something that men,

[00:59:28] at least in America, don't do very often.

[00:59:32] Yeah, yeah, no, I agree.

[00:59:33] He needs it. And it's also like he becomes kind of a child at that moment, too.

[00:59:39] Which is an accusation that he levels at Donnie in the beginning of the movie.

[00:59:44] But yeah, like he just like, yeah, he needs to be comforted.

[00:59:48] And and the dude is he always rolls with everything.

[00:59:53] Like once he he gets that sort of acceptance from Walter,

[00:59:56] then he's willing to give him the hug.

[01:00:00] You know, it's funny about the nihilism thing

[01:00:01] because there are actual so-called nihilists in the movie.

[01:00:06] And they're the most ridiculous characters.

[01:00:10] Absolutely. They're the most.

[01:00:13] And you know, they're one of the great lines when they want

[01:00:17] they start we want the money in the basket after he's like, no,

[01:00:21] there's no hostage. He's like, well, we still want it.

[01:00:24] It's not fair. And then Walter says, fair.

[01:00:27] Who's the fucking nihilist?

[01:00:30] I know I was going to say they're terrible nihilists.

[01:00:32] Like it's not they act with more purpose and meaning than anybody else.

[01:00:37] They just want money.

[01:00:40] And I also like there's some line in his funeral oration

[01:00:44] where he says in accordance with what your wishes might well have been.

[01:00:53] They don't really know anything about Donny, you know, like nobody knows anything in this movie.

[01:01:00] And it's not like and there's nobody to contact for Donny.

[01:01:03] Like there's no there's just no attachments beyond this little world.

[01:01:09] All right. So that's a good bridge into my next scene,

[01:01:11] which is the opening scene after this is pretty much the scene follows my last scene,

[01:01:18] but you have the opening credits, which is just so beautifully choreographed.

[01:01:23] The bowling alley and the aesthetic of that and the weird grace of it all.

[01:01:29] And then into the introduction of Walter and Donny at the bowling alley

[01:01:36] and talking about the rug. They really tied the room together.

[01:01:39] And it's just a comic masterpiece of a scene.

[01:01:42] First, you have the dude explaining that they beat on his rug.

[01:01:45] You have Walter just immediately getting pissed off about that.

[01:01:50] And then again, like relating it to his past experiences, to the war.

[01:01:56] And then all the interruptions and then Donny coming back kind of into the conversation.

[01:02:01] And already you get a sense that Donny is just always three or four seconds at best behind

[01:02:09] what's going on.

[01:02:10] And Walter, what is the point?

[01:02:13] Look, we all know who is at fault here.

[01:02:15] What the fuck are you talking about?

[01:02:17] Huh? No, what the fuck are you?

[01:02:19] I'm not...

[01:02:21] We're talking about unchecked aggression here.

[01:02:23] What the fuck is he talking about?

[01:02:24] My rug.

[01:02:25] Forget it, Donny. You're out of your element.

[01:02:27] Walter, the Chinaman who peed on my rug.

[01:02:30] I can't go give him a bill.

[01:02:32] So what the fuck are you talking about?

[01:02:33] What the fuck are you talking about?

[01:02:34] The Chinaman is not the issue here, dude.

[01:02:37] I'm talking about drawing a line in the sand, dude.

[01:02:39] Across this line, you do not.

[01:02:42] Also, dude, Chinaman is not the preferred no-enclature.

[01:02:46] Asian American please.

[01:02:48] Walter, this isn't a guy who built the railroads here.

[01:02:51] This is a guy...

[01:02:51] What the fuck are you talking about?

[01:02:53] Walter, he peed on my rug.

[01:02:55] He peed on the dude's rug.

[01:02:56] Donny, you're out of your element, dude.

[01:02:58] The Chinaman is not the issue here.

[01:03:01] So it's just like it captures perfectly the banter, the interruption, the...

[01:03:06] It introduces you to...

[01:03:08] If the prelude sort of introduced you to the themes of the movie,

[01:03:12] this just introduces you so perfectly in such an entertaining way

[01:03:16] to all the characters and just sets up the plot.

[01:03:20] It's just such a perfect way of setting up what this movie is going to be.

[01:03:26] And yeah, I love it.

[01:03:29] Yeah.

[01:03:30] Okay, my last favorite scene is...

[01:03:36] This again, I think goes with my theme, but it's the scene where they go confront

[01:03:45] Larry with his homework and his dad's in an iron lung.

[01:03:51] It's just a perfectly absurd scene.

[01:03:53] Right?

[01:03:53] So basically they think that this kid, some high school kid, took their car

[01:04:00] and must have the money that was in a briefcase.

[01:04:03] And so they do their detective work.

[01:04:07] And I just love the fact that they have his crumpled up homework laminated.

[01:04:12] Walter pulls it out of his briefcase and he's like, is this your homework, Larry?

[01:04:17] Dude, please, isn't this your homework, Larry?

[01:04:19] You know, and the kid is just a little shit and he's not saying a word.

[01:04:22] I don't even remember if he says a word in this scene.

[01:04:25] And his father...

[01:04:26] I don't think he does.

[01:04:27] ...his father is in an iron lung just in the background,

[01:04:32] being kept alive by this big machinery.

[01:04:34] I don't know what that was, but it is this...

[01:04:38] Aesthetically, it looks like a futuristic thing from a movie in the 50s.

[01:04:45] Yeah, exactly.

[01:04:46] That's what it looks like.

[01:04:47] So it's the machine that keeps people breathing who it was very commonly used for polio patients

[01:04:54] because the degeneration of the muscles and polio made it really hard for people to breathe.

[01:05:00] And so many people were in these machines not all day, every day, but often for long,

[01:05:08] long parts of the day just to help them breathe.

[01:05:09] But it's that perfect aesthetic, that 50s futuristic, you know,

[01:05:13] something you would see in Tomorrowland.

[01:05:16] And so they're confronting about the homework.

[01:05:19] Clearly, the kid's not saying anything and probably doesn't know anything.

[01:05:22] And Walter is just getting increasingly angry.

[01:05:26] Is this your homework, Larry?

[01:05:27] Sit your car out front.

[01:05:28] Is this your homework, Larry?

[01:05:30] We know it's this fucking homework.

[01:05:31] Where is the fucking money, little brat?

[01:05:34] Look, Larry, have you ever heard of Vietnam?

[01:05:37] You're entering a world of pain, son.

[01:05:39] We know that this is your homework.

[01:05:41] We know that you stole a car.

[01:05:42] And the fucking money.

[01:05:43] And the fucking money.

[01:05:45] And we know that this is your homework.

[01:05:46] I'm gonna cut your dick off, Larry.

[01:05:48] You're killing your father, Larry.

[01:05:53] All right, this is pointless.

[01:05:56] Okay, time for plan B.

[01:05:59] You might want to watch out that front window, Larry.

[01:06:05] Son, this is what happens when you fuck a stranger in the ass.

[01:06:10] Language problem here.

[01:06:12] Little prick stonewall indeed.

[01:06:18] You mean this is when he's crashing the car?

[01:06:19] Yeah, that he's, yeah, he goes outside and he's just bashing a Corvette,

[01:06:24] which turns out again as a mistake not to be the kids,

[01:06:28] but rather to be the neighbors across the street.

[01:06:33] So once again, with this like, this is like a noir that is constantly trying to get off

[01:06:40] the ground and never quite manages to, right?

[01:06:44] And then the dude's car is always the victim of all these misunderstandings.

[01:06:49] So in this case, the guy fucks up the dude's car, like said,

[01:06:52] but in every one that every time that Walter fucks something up,

[01:06:56] it's the dude's car that suffers until it finally just gets burned up and destroyed.

[01:07:01] And the neighbor is like, I kill your fucking car.

[01:07:05] It's awesome.

[01:07:06] And then that's a classic line from the movie.

[01:07:09] You see what happens, Larry?

[01:07:10] Do you see what happens when you fuck a stranger in the ass?

[01:07:15] Yeah.

[01:07:16] And just the absurd, I mean, I think I really like it because of the absurdity

[01:07:21] of the situation, right?

[01:07:22] They're confronting some 15 year old with laminated homework,

[01:07:25] iron lung in the background.

[01:07:26] They're trying to solve some mystery that has absolutely nothing to do with what's going on

[01:07:30] in the moment.

[01:07:31] And it just ends up being again wrong and fucks up the dude's car.

[01:07:37] Nothing comes of that.

[01:07:39] No, they're going to cut your dick off Larry.

[01:07:44] The dude still thinks like when he's talking to Jackie Treehorn,

[01:07:48] he tells him like that Larry has the money.

[01:07:51] Yeah.

[01:07:52] And then he just says, so if you could write out a check for $5,000 for me,

[01:07:57] that would be great.

[01:07:57] Yeah.

[01:07:58] Oh, I think I almost forgot this in my game for it is Walter's at his just at the end

[01:08:05] of his patience and he goes, you're killing your father, Larry.

[01:08:10] It's also such a funny transition because he starts out for Walter so respectful.

[01:08:16] Yeah, because they're fans of the guy in the iron lung.

[01:08:19] And then just switches on a dime to pure rage.

[01:08:24] No, that's great.

[01:08:25] Little prick is stonewalling me.

[01:08:27] So it's funny your scenes are definitely good and I had a real problem with this

[01:08:34] because I kind of love every scene and I don't know like and just choosing one

[01:08:41] just makes me feel like I'm sliding the other ones.

[01:08:46] I had the same problem with the bolt fiction actually.

[01:08:48] I was like every scene belongs.

[01:08:50] Here's what I'm doing with my last scene is a cheat like a tie.

[01:08:55] The rest of the movie is the rest of the movie.

[01:08:57] Your last scene.

[01:08:58] There's two characters that we haven't talked about that are just so good and

[01:09:05] iconic in their own way.

[01:09:06] Philip Seymour Hoffman as the like the Smithers of the big Lebowski.

[01:09:15] So after he meets with Lebowski, which is another great scene in its own right.

[01:09:22] He takes the rug and they go out and they see Tara Reid.

[01:09:26] Sort of like a big sleep parody where you have this young woman and she's being flirtatious

[01:09:35] sexually telling him to blow on her toes and then says I'll suck your cock for $1,000.

[01:09:44] You're not blowing.

[01:09:46] Our guest has to be getting along Mrs. Lebowski.

[01:09:49] Oh you're funny.

[01:09:53] I'll suck your cock for $1,000.

[01:10:00] Wonderful woman.

[01:10:01] We're all we're all very fond of her, very free spirited.

[01:10:04] Bran can't watch though or he has to be a hundred.

[01:10:08] That's marvelous.

[01:10:10] I'm just gonna go find a cash machine.

[01:10:17] I just love this line he goes that's marvelous.

[01:10:23] He does such a good job of being such a tight ass.

[01:10:27] Yeah no he's very funny.

[01:10:28] He's another performance that grows on you the more you see it and that's just a

[01:10:33] it's just a great scene that's where you're introduced to the nihilist.

[01:10:36] He's just passed out in the pool.

[01:10:38] He's a nihilist must be exhausting.

[01:10:41] Yeah so that's the first one and the second one is Jesus Quintano.

[01:10:47] John Turturro glad you brought him up.

[01:10:49] We can't not talk about John Turturro's performance here.

[01:10:54] It is and it's iconic too like he doesn't get much screen time but what he gets it's like

[01:11:00] holy fucking shit that opening where it's just this music and you just cut to him with the bowling ball

[01:11:08] and then he just licks the bowling ball and then it's in slow motion.

[01:11:12] He bowls a strike all this in slow motion turns around and just does this like I don't know what

[01:11:18] kind of dance like some sort of like salsa whatever to the music of Hotel California in

[01:11:27] like a Latinized version of it.

[01:11:29] Yeah a Latinized version of it and then he comes over to them and starts talking shit

[01:11:37] you ready to be fucked man I see you rolled you way into the 70s I can't do this.

[01:11:44] Dios mio man.

[01:11:45] Dios mio man.

[01:11:48] Llema me we're gonna fuck you up.

[01:11:51] Yeah well you know that's just like your opinion man.

[01:11:58] Let me tell you something Pandèo you pulling your crazy shit with us you flash a piece out on the

[01:12:05] lanes and take it away from you and stick it up your ass and pull a fucking trigger till it goes.

[01:12:12] Click.

[01:12:15] Jesus.

[01:12:16] You said it man nobody fucks with the Jesus.

[01:12:23] Eight year olds dude.

[01:12:28] All that like his his performance is so good and and his partner Liam like I it's it's so

[01:12:36] just that guy and the fact that those two are together is just so funny.

[01:12:43] He steals the scene and and you know in terms of iconic status he steals

[01:12:51] the movie almost right like that if there is a character to be remembered.

[01:12:56] There's a great like slow mo this is part of the slow mo after he shoots the strike where he just

[01:13:02] he just stares them down he stares at all of them this before they've met or before they've

[01:13:06] had any encounter that we've seen and for any and then you just cut I mean a shot where you

[01:13:12] see I think it's first first the dude then Walter and then Donnie and then he just kind

[01:13:18] of he does like a kiss he does like a slow mo kiss to Donnie and Donnie just kind of blink just

[01:13:25] also the way that that Jesus can turn that cleans his bowling ball the way that he's

[01:13:31] standing in the squat looking a big ball sack.

[01:13:37] He's supposed to be making a sequel.

[01:13:42] Yeah I think that's more legend than true but I yeah so like I just wanted to it's

[01:13:48] less a scene because I really do love all these scenes but more just those two performances

[01:13:55] I thought needed some love because we haven't mentioned them and they're both so good.

[01:14:00] I think it's a good call.

[01:14:01] All right all right so let's talk about which one of these movies is better.

[01:14:07] Do we have to? They're both so good they're both so good it's just delight my love for

[01:14:14] them has just grown from just talking about them.

[01:14:16] I'll say that it's almost not fair because I think pulp fiction doesn't gain from as many

[01:14:28] rewatches as the Big Lebowski does so like if you just did it after you saw each of them once

[01:14:35] pulp fiction would be and like the most obvious winner of this like say you both saw them in

[01:14:42] the theater like I yeah I agree I would say a little differently that like there is a like an

[01:14:48] inverted U to pulp fiction so like I think you still need to watch it more than once

[01:14:55] and there's like a point at which and I think I've passed that point where rewatches are no

[01:15:00] longer going to yield anything new. And some of the scenes turn from really good to a little

[01:15:08] annoying. Some of the stuff like the Royale with cheese first time you see it it's very funny and

[01:15:13] then it but now it sort of seems like oh that's Tarantino doing his thing. And I agree like I

[01:15:21] actually got a lot out of rewatching it because I hadn't in a while you know in a few years pulp

[01:15:26] fiction but it really was like it was an event to see it in the theater in a way that Big

[01:15:32] Lebowski definitely wasn't and it's still not that great to see in the theater unless you're

[01:15:38] in a crowd of people who absolutely love it. It's funny because Quentin Tarantino made this

[01:15:44] comparison and I think it fits here so it's in the DVD of Jackie Brown which is maybe my favorite

[01:15:54] Tarantino movie and he's talking about the difference between Jackie Brown and pulp fiction

[01:16:00] and he says pulp fiction is this thing you get together you watch it it's that's how it's

[01:16:05] meant to be experienced. And then Jackie Brown on the other hand this is a movie that is that you

[01:16:11] could have on while you're like folding laundry you know like you're doing other things you just

[01:16:16] want to be in this world with these characters for a little while so it's a like he separated

[01:16:23] the genre of those two movies in a way that I actually think works maybe even better it works

[01:16:30] fine with those two but it works even better with the Big Lebowski and pulp fiction.

[01:16:34] Big Lebowski is a movie you travel with and it's just fun to have it's obviously we haven't talked

[01:16:40] about this but it might be the perfect stoner movie like you get stoned and watch the Big Lebowski

[01:16:45] you're you've never been happier and it's you can start and stop watching it at any point

[01:16:52] it's like a friend it's like something you take with you it's something whereas pulp fiction

[01:16:57] is a different thing. Yeah it is apples and oranges I find it a little hard to catch that

[01:17:03] intuition about the being able to like I think I've watched pulp fiction so many times that it is to

[01:17:09] me a perfect background movie but I get I get why it can't be for the first few watches because

[01:17:17] it's it's driven plot driven in a way where attention is required. The other thing to

[01:17:24] me is that one of the reasons apples and oranges is pulp fiction feels like Tarantino had a bunch of

[01:17:33] ideas that he had just been waiting to get down he strung them together and made a movies movie

[01:17:41] like you know a lot of this is just it oozes Tarantino's love for movies

[01:17:46] yeah and I feel like you know it feels like somebody's first movie even though it wasn't his first movie

[01:17:55] it feels like he the device with which he ties together all the stories was an excuse

[01:18:03] to have these scenes. You can just picture him like thinking about like oh there's this

[01:18:07] gold watch scene that I want oh there's this other scene where like imagine this dude has to

[01:18:11] like take out the mob boss's girlfriend you know right yeah and and he ties them together in a way

[01:18:16] that ended up ended up I think being brilliant but it but it is it's just a different kind of film it

[01:18:22] was like it it was Tarantino flexing his movie muscle in a way that the Coen brothers are just

[01:18:30] so much more subtle in the way that they made the big Lebowski. It is a slow growing love

[01:18:36] because it's just not obvious that it's a great film. You can get hung up on trying to follow

[01:18:40] the plot at first you know and this is a riff on a lot of noir movies yeah right which are all

[01:18:48] you know famously convoluted plots but if you do that and you don't look at it more as a character

[01:18:55] driven comedy with just unbelievably great lines and scenes you know that will hurt your

[01:19:03] enjoyment. Right maybe that's it that maybe maybe I made the mistake that time maybe that's a common

[01:19:07] first watch mistake to think that there is something there I mean this is you know there is nothing there

[01:19:13] in the big Lebowski in the way that you think that there ought to be something there that if you

[01:19:17] watch it out of completely out of context you're like wait okay so wait is there a mystery here

[01:19:22] like what's right and there's still it's still not totally clear like Jackie Treehorn's

[01:19:30] uh five million dollars or whatever what happened to it or like what the reason I

[01:19:37] I am a big Lebowski man to tie it back is that I I love all the characters so much

[01:19:46] I just love the vibe of it so much and I love the flow of it is so perfect maybe it boils down

[01:19:54] to the fact that you smoke pot and I don't even though most of our listeners think that I do

[01:20:00] where the big Lebowski I feel like I maybe that's part of it like I feel like I can put

[01:20:04] Pulp Fiction on and just watch one of the scenes and be entertained and that's sort of a pro to me

[01:20:10] also the you're totally right that like you know hearing the Royale with cheese conversation

[01:20:16] a million times you're just like okay this is more Tarantino but it is the the quotability

[01:20:22] of all that dialogue that's one of the things that just makes me you know I can sit there and

[01:20:25] and like a nerd kind of like just be saying the movie yeah the whole like the whole script to me

[01:20:31] seems quotable um and and I love it because of that the best scenes of the Pulp in Pulp Fiction

[01:20:39] achieve a peak movie dumb that I you know arguably I suppose that even though Tarantino

[01:20:45] has made movies that one could defend as better than Pulp Fiction there's just those standalone

[01:20:52] scenes that I think are just they're just so good the there's set pieces yeah that are just so phenomenal

[01:21:02] and well this summer I'm very excited for once upon a time in Hollywood like very excited

[01:21:07] I'm a little worried about it but yeah really I'm excited to watch it but I'm a little worried

[01:21:12] that it's that it might become just one of those movies that's made for the Hollywood insiders

[01:21:19] you know like the Coen brothers made a movie that I thought was just what's the name that

[01:21:23] with George Clooney where it's like about actors in old Hollywood oh yeah uh Hail Caesar yeah I love

[01:21:31] Hail Caesar yeah I didn't like it yeah I could see that that's not your that's not your I actually

[01:21:36] really like Hail Caesar it's campy by the way yeah I mean I think I think although I'm squarely a

[01:21:42] Pulp Fiction man maybe it's just about the weed and maybe we both agree that's unfair to uh

[01:21:49] to pit these two against each other but like at the end of the day if I'm gonna have to if

[01:21:53] you're forced me to rewatch a movie I'll probably pick Pulp Fiction um it is weird I I mean I

[01:22:00] yeah like I've probably seen Big Lebowski

[01:22:05] way more time stoned than not stoned probably it's a it's a stonely like it is a like it's the

[01:22:11] perfect stoner movie and yeah I could see how if you're just not not stoned or you don't get

[01:22:18] stoned but that does that's just gonna take away a little bit yeah because those scenes the

[01:22:24] surreal scenes you know the musical numbers I think those are perfect stoner scenes um can I just

[01:22:30] really quickly like especially the second one you know how how um the dude is always just

[01:22:37] integrating what Peeris people have said into his language yes um I didn't and I've seen Pulp Fiction

[01:22:45] way more times than I've seen The Big Lebowski but there is a time I noticed this time where

[01:22:49] the the the old the big the actual old man Lebowski says I will not abide by this

[01:22:57] I noticed the same thing the first time on this what yes and I was like oh

[01:23:02] shit that's where the dude abides come from and for the for once he changes it he actually

[01:23:08] is like instead of just saying like I don't will not abide he says that the dude abides

[01:23:13] he says I will not abide another toe he says in the limo it's so funny that you bring that up

[01:23:21] I noticed that too for the first time because I was it because that the dude abides is like

[01:23:28] it is it's like the basis of a philosophy that some people live I forget what it's called

[01:23:34] dudeism or something it's so iconic and yes it definitely comes from but you're right he

[01:23:41] changes it he changes it which is to me that if there is any character growth it is that the dude

[01:23:48] cared about the rug enough to get pissed off and start this whole thing going it was a horrible

[01:23:53] experience and now he's just like yeah the dude can abide that's how that was that's what makes

[01:23:58] me different from The Big Lebowski that guy cares so much that he's lying to the world for

[01:24:03] the sake of appearances and the dude should have known fucking better

[01:24:12] I'm glad you brought that up because I that is that was something that's so weird struck me

[01:24:18] and it's just great because you know that's also what Sam Elliott ends by the dude abides

[01:24:23] exactly I don't know about you but I find comfort in that and then even that comes from

[01:24:29] one of the least likable characters in the movie yeah he just takes he just takes what the world

[01:24:35] gives him puts it in and then just it comes out in a different in some sort of different form

[01:24:42] right another scene if I was doing another scene the two limo back-to-back limo scenes first him

[01:24:48] talking to the guy who's taking him away from mods yeah I got a rash is that what he's

[01:24:54] making himself yeah he's drinking the right white Russian in the car and he's just so chill it's

[01:25:00] like everything's going well and he is like yeah fuck it you know like he's abiding at that moment

[01:25:09] and then he gets dragged into the other limo where they show him the toe and then it's

[01:25:13] the both movies have classic lines like there's so many funny lines just Walter like you want

[01:25:20] a toe I can get you a toe well I can get you a toe by three three o'clock this afternoon the way

[01:25:25] that he laughs mockingly at everything that the opponents are throwing at him he's like yeah

[01:25:30] he's just like amateur the funny thing is about that one though he turns out to be right

[01:25:35] like he's completely right about that it wasn't bunny it wasn't and they did like it was

[01:25:41] somebody oh is that Amy man yeah because they went when they're showing her ordering her pancakes

[01:25:50] yeah I know I mean I yeah it's a man yeah I didn't notice that until this watching

[01:25:56] I just don't know really Amy I know the name yeah I couldn't talk about it

[01:26:01] smoky this is not numb this is bowling there are rules such a great line

[01:26:07] I just want to also point out that in true Tamler fashion when we were giving each other lists

[01:26:12] and we decided on three I think you snuck in five yeah and none of them like yours were well

[01:26:19] thought out mine words just I love this you know it's a very hard movie to talk about

[01:26:25] even though I think it is very thematically rich both movies yeah but I think Lebowski is

[01:26:32] thematically rich here's the last reason I would say big Lebowski over Pulp Fiction it is it is my

[01:26:38] favorite of the Cohen brothers movies and I love a lot of other ones but it's my favorite

[01:26:44] and Pulp Fiction is not my favorite Tarantino movie you see which one is Jackie Brown you said

[01:26:50] I think Jackie Brown and I think I like Inglourious Basterds better I think I like Kill Bill Volume

[01:26:56] one better that's it I think I think then it would come before any of the other yeah it's

[01:27:04] definitely my favorite Tarantino movie it's almost put in a category on its own where like

[01:27:12] I feel it's unfair to compare but it's just me why why why do you throw shade on Jackie Brown

[01:27:20] I don't no I didn't no I didn't I don't think I said anything about about Jack Brown I love Jackie

[01:27:25] no but you know yeah commission by omission you never talk about yeah I have it ranked mine

[01:27:35] I think Jackie Brown just personally historically was hard for me because I

[01:27:40] seeing it I had such high expectations after Pulp Fiction that Jackie Brown is a movie that

[01:27:46] it took me a long time to appreciate I think it's a great movie but but there is something about the

[01:27:55] like mildly anthology nature of Pulp Fiction that I dig so much in the way that he plays with

[01:28:01] time and storytelling and that that it just seems like a different movie to me like any movie

[01:28:06] that's that's linear and and just a plot like like I just I it seems like a different beast to me

[01:28:15] like I feel like if I'm gonna rate Tarantino pictures I have to like just set Pulp Fiction aside

[01:28:22] and if so Jackie Brown is up there for me but so is reservoir dogs um yeah reservoir dogs is great

[01:28:28] but wasn't on your list of top no but I like I it's close to Pulp Fiction for me yeah I mean

[01:28:36] so Jackie Brown though it does have a kind of cool time thing towards the end but what

[01:28:42] Jackie Brown has is so much heart you know like yeah in all the I love Pam Grier too

[01:28:50] she's so good and the and the scenes with her and Robert Forrester yeah he's so sincere he's so

[01:28:57] sincere yeah no but I when I first saw it I was the same as you like I you know love Pulp Fiction

[01:29:02] was so excited and was a little disappointed with Jackie Brown but then I rewatching it it is

[01:29:09] it's it's I that's why the Tarantino observation I think is right like it is something that benefits

[01:29:17] from re rewatching over 10 rewatches or over seven rewatches or something like nothing gets

[01:29:24] annoying for me in Jackie Brown right it's hard because Pulp Fiction be permeated the culture

[01:29:30] and influence other filmmakers in such a way that I feel like there's just it could never have been a

[01:29:37] cult like sleeper you know it's just like you're right like you hear like so there've been so many

[01:29:43] parodies of the conversations between the two hitmen for instance that it's just hard for it's

[01:29:49] like that that it wouldn't get old yeah yeah what's your uh I had something I had something

[01:29:58] rambling still to ask you but now I'm forgetting it I was gonna talk about I don't think I've I've seen

[01:30:07] all of the Cohen films enough time to be able to speak with any confidence about my ranking

[01:30:12] of best Cohen brothers movies um but what are yours is Lebowski just solidly number one

[01:30:20] it's solidly number one and then it's a little harder for me like I first of all I don't like

[01:30:26] yeah no there are ones weirdly they they're capable of making films that I just would rather not see

[01:30:33] burn after reading which some people like I just don't like I gave it another chance I

[01:30:39] me too I did the same thing yeah yeah and I was like no I was right it's not that good

[01:30:45] intolerable cruelty which is widely not considered one of their good ones I also don't like

[01:30:51] I don't love uh oh brother where where are you though I was I thought I would hate it and

[01:30:57] and I ended up liking it so that's like a case where but I think that it wouldn't make

[01:31:05] close to my top I think that true grit no country for old men

[01:31:12] Fargo Fargo for sure Fargo might be my favorite yeah yeah that's probably my second favorite

[01:31:18] no yeah I really like a serious man yeah a serious man we could do an episode I feel like we could

[01:31:24] I feel like like this is them them just straight up tackling what I think they were low-key tackling

[01:31:30] in Lebowski but in a very very different way well it's you we know oh book of Job yeah

[01:31:38] and a serious man we could put yeah let's do that like because it is kind of their version yep

[01:31:47] of it and we've been wanting to talk about book of Job so yeah yeah I'm down oh I like the new one

[01:31:56] have you seen the new nap the one that just was on Netflix oh yeah that's yeah they did an

[01:32:03] essentially an anthology within a film and it's I really liked it ballad of Buster's Grugs

[01:32:11] yeah also fun rewatch it's great all right so we settled it

[01:32:22] it is kind of a it almost hurts me to vote on it join us next time on very bad

[01:33:06] you're a very bad man and a very good man just a very bad wizard