Best Film of 1998

Rating: 10/10 (31 August 1999)

This was simply the best picture of the year, and it annoys me that it didn't get a single Academy Award Nomination. It was perfectly written, amazingly acted, wonderfully directed, there wasn't a single thing wrong with the film. If you ever talk to a person who did not enjoy this film, it's because it was too far above them. There are plenty of jokes for everyone. And then there are the perfectly added "inside jokes" as well. Such as the several references to "Branded" an old TV show. A show the characters in the film loved. They talked of it lasting hundreds of episodes, when in fact, there were only a handful of episodes. There were jokes about every day life. Jokes about the simple fact that the Dude is a dinosaur. Every other "radical" or "hippie" grew up, got jobs, and stopped with the drugs. The Dude on the other hand, is still living in the 60s. And if you look at his friends they all have their own little stories, and show how deeply their pasts affect them. However, they show this great characterization through jokes. Something very hard to do. For example Walter(Goodman)obviously hit his peak and the height of his life, back in Vietnam and when he was married. So, the jokes about him are Walter spazzing at people "I AM A UNITED STATES VETERAN!" And that's how we get to know him. How unique is that? The same thing can be said of Donnie(Buscemi) here is an ex-surfer who obviously did drugs, and they took his mind, you know this from his sheer absent mindedness. It's truly a unique film, of which we shall never see the like again, and for that I'm sorry. It's the Coen brothers at top form.