The Big Lebowski - Researching Genre

Genre
The film's genre is neo-noir, crime, comedy and stoner. Neo-noir films are similar to film noir, which are traditional Hollywood crime dramas, but neo-noir has similar themes with updated themes and content. The Big Lebowski has the Dude as a detective, which was a very popular character in film noir, it also has the millionaire Jeffrey Lebowski as the corrupt antagonist, which is another common character in those kinds of films. Crime films usually focus on the lives of criminals, and glorifies the drama and violence seen in them. But the Dude gets involved with these criminals just for the money as kind of sees all the violence as an outsider, and tries not to get included in it. 

Narrative
The protagonist 'The Dude' is an unemployed slacker who is a keen bowler. He gets mistaken for being Jeff Lebowski when thugs break into his house, Lebowski is a millionaire who shares the same name as the Dude. When the millionaire's wife gets kidnapped he gets the Dude to deliver the ransom for her release. But the Dude's friend Walter plans to keep the full ransom for themselves, the plan goes wrong and they lose the money. The millionaire's daughter, Maude, meets with the Dude and thinks the wife kidnapped herself for the money. The Dude then gets into trouble with the wife's 'kidnappers', gets drugged, and when he wakes in his own home with Mauve, she reveals it was all set up by the millionaire to get more money and the wife just went on a trip. So the Dude and his friends go back to their lives and continue working on their bowling tournament. 

The film follows a linear narrative, and slowly reveals information about what's happening as the Dude realises what's going on. So the audience only knows as much as he does, when he does.

Representation
Key Characters -



Jeff "the Dude" Lebowski - the main protagonist, played by Jeff Bridges, and is a white male in his 40s, living in Los Angleas. He is unemployed, and enjoys drinking, bowling, Creedence Clearwater Revival.



Walter Sobchak - the Dude's friend and bowling teammate, played by John Goodman, he represents the group of people as the Dude. He has a violent temper due to his time as a soldier in Vietnam.



Donny - the Dude's friend and bowling teammate, played by Steve Buscemi, he represents the group of people as the Dude and Walter. He is naive and good-natured but doesn't get involved in most of the drama in the film. 

 

Jeffrey Lebowski - the film's antagonist millionaire, played by David Huddlestone, he is white, rich and wheelchair bound. He likes to think of himself as successful but in reality has no money and depends on his daughter.



Maude Lebowski - daughter of Jeffrey Lebowski, played by Julienne Moore. She is a feminist artist who handles all the Lebowski's money. She is one of the only key characters that is female, and both her and her father are of a high class and status. 



Bunny Lebowski - trophy wife of Jeff Lebowski, played by Tara Reid. She is seen as a stereotypical 'blonde bimbo' by most of the characters, who thinks she is just scamming her husband's money.  

Audience
The audience for the Big Lebowski is predominantly males, aged 18-35.

Rick Altman Theory 
Semantic elements - The main characters are are all seen with drugs and guns at some point with a fair amount of violence, which is typically seen in the crime genre. Also there are large amounts of money involved which is often seen in crime and normally the driving point of the plot, as the main characters often fight for who will end up with the money, or someone owes someone money. Then the drugs and psychedelic scenes are often seen in stoner films, and the main character is smoking or drinking something in nearly every scene he is in. The film is set in a city, going from quite run down and poorer areas to very rich areas, with mansions, both crime and neo noir films are often based in cites and largely populated areas. Also the soundtrack has Bob Dylan, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Elvis Costello and Nina Simone, which is mainly American rock, blues or folk music.

Syntactic elements - The plot is centered around the Dude trying to get money from what he thinks is a kidnapping, which shows the crime elements of the film,