The big Lebowski - 1998

I watched it for the first time.. honestly I'm not sure why it's such a cult. It's about the Dude (Jeff Bridges) having the same name of millionaire Jeffrey Lebowski (David Huddleston) : the big Lebowski. Because of this, he's assaulted in his home by people mistaking them and demanding back the money Lebowski's young wife Bunny (Tara Reid) owns Treehorn (Ben Gazzara). They ruin his carpet, so he goes to Mr Lebowski to get a new one, but fails. He lies and has Brandt (Philip Seymour Hoffman) give him a new rug. Lebowski's daughter Maude (Julianne Moore) breaks into his house with two thugs to get it back, since it's hers. When Bunny disappears, the Dude is hired to make the exchange, to deliver the ransom money, but his friend Walter (John Goodman) gives them a fake case instead because he wants to steal the ransom money, then his car is stolen with the money inside. Eventually it's found, but no case inside.
Maude tells the dude that those people did not abduct Bunny, they are her friends, and also reveals that her father has no money, really. Her mother had it all, and left it to their family fundation, and Maude gives him money every month! So the Dude understands it all: Lebowski gave him no money, he took advantage of the situation to keep it all. Bunny comes back, she had simply gone on a trip, and knowing about it three men had tried to gain some money. When they attack the Dude and his friends, Walter defeats them (biting a ear off one, throwing a bowling ball on another..) but Donny (Steve Buscemi) has a heart attack and dies.
The Dude doesn't have a job, he drinks and smokes and plays bowling and that's it: it's not clear to me where he takes the money to live.
Walter is a war veteran who is crazy, he goes mad for any little thing. He draws a gun on the face of a man that was marking points Walter thought he didn't deserve at bowling game, for example.
He's out of his mind, always talking about the war, making trouble. I think he gives a really bad image to war veterans, in a way, because Walter is really crazy, okay, his actions are not justified. Now, that man I saw once on youtube stopping a police-people fight at some demonstration, that man was a good example. Walter is simply out of his mind.
Strangely enough, he causes no trouble, no fight every time that Jesus (John Turturro) makes a scene, saying he'll win the bowling championship. Maybe in this case he simply wants to deal with it beating him at the game. Walter takes bowling very seriously. He also fancies himself a serious Jewish, although he only became one when he got married to his now ex-wife. Even when they spread Donny's ashes, Walter talked only of the war.
It's a strange movie, where all the characters are kind of crazy. All of them. I don't see what is so precious about this Dude, he seems to be nothing special; he was, yes, a bit shaken for a moment when he thought Bunny could be in real danger because of what they did, and when he thought he himself was in serious danger, but it didn't last long. Not even Donny's death touched him much. His philosophy must be something like "oh well life goes on". We know for sure Walter's philosophy: "fuck it, let's go bowling". That appears to be the only thing that matters, at least to Walter. The Dude doesn't seem too involved in anything, actually. Still, I liked Bridges a lot, great, really great. The others too, it was a well done movie, all the actors were good. Buscemi had a very little role, he only said a few words from time to time, only to be silenced by Walter or the Dude's "shut up".
The dream sequences, honestly, were not my thing, I didn't like them, and it wasn't clear to me their meaning: he had passed out, it's not like he was on drugs hallucinating. This is not the movie I expected, given its big fame, but maybe it's mostly a cultural thing I can't understand, who knows.