Disenfranchised #21

Dude.

The straight roads of the flat, long island led to a winding bridge and we cross into mainland New Jersey where all of the roads crisscross at sharp and overbearing angles. My vague memory doesn’t carry me to the package store as quickly as I expect, and after consulting a map, my brother and I sit at a stop sign for ten minutes waiting to turn left. I give up and turn right. Our hand was forced. There was no choice at that intersection, not really. The directions we consult take us to the back entrance. We drive by strip mall employees chain smoking outside of unmarked, brown doors. They stare into the car at us as we drive by where we don’t belong.

Tasked with picking out a straightforward pilsner, I scan the shelf and grab a four-pack. I pay for it and we drive back to the beach house on the small, dry island. Drinking one later, while the oppressive sun shines and the humid ocean air hangs densely around me, I inspect it further. Above a muddy, black and red image of a carpet with the top halves of bowling pins dotting the bottom, the label reads “Alternate Ending Presents Royal Rug Pils.” On the side, small lines of all caps text in a slightly tracked out sans serif say, “The dude will abide one wish . . . a rug that ties the whole new world together.” Ah, of course. This movie will never stop following me.

It’s easier to see the patterns from a distance. Of course, the child who watched Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) over and over again would immediately fall for the cable edit of The Big Lebowski (1998) when he stumbled on it in high school. So entranced, I didn’t even notice the nonsensical ADR of John Goodman yelling, “this is what happens when you find a stranger in the alps” (instead of “fuck a stranger in the ass”). I bought it on DVD. I watched it over and over. I abided. The Big Lebowski was a seminal object but not one I based my life on (except for drinking White Russians too often when I got to college). Already, my hair was long like Jeff Bridges’ The Dude and wrapped in a bandanna like John Goodman’s Walter. Already, I loved bowling. I narrowly escaped the life of the movie’s super fans: yearly Lebowski Fest, only talking in movie quotes, a religion called Dudeism.

I sold much of my movie collection the summer after I graduated. I only held onto movies that properly befit someone with a BFA. I only held onto movies that were “Important.” Goodbye to The Big Lebowski and an extensive collection of Adam Sandler features. We all make mistakes. A few years later, I started watching the Coen Brother’s filmography in order, but I didn’t make it to The Dude’s adventure. I misread the Wikipedia list and, after Blood Simple (1984), I stumbled my way through the Coen written but Sam Raimi directed Crimewave (1985). It turned me off so much that I abandoned the project. I did re-watch Lebowski, eventually. A decade had passed. The movie was still great. For some new reasons, for some of the same reasons. I will avoid paraphrasing Twelve Monkeys (1995) by quoting it directly: “The movie never changes. It can’t change. But every time you see it, it seems different because you’re different.”

What then of the curio that had emerged in the intervening years? John Turturro wanted to reprise his character from The Big Lebowski, but the Coen Brothers were not interested. Jesus Quintana licked his bowling ball and did a silly dance. He polished his bowling ball with phallic grace. Turturro says he was only interested in making Joel and Ethan laugh on the day. His Jesus character had its roots on the stage. Joel Coen and his wife, Frances McDormand, saw Turturro perform at the Public Theater in a trio of one acts. Joel liked the character so much, he wrote a small part for him into a script he was working on. When asked about The Big Lebowski after his prequel is finally released, Turturro always brings it back to his character, the one he developed for the stage.

Shot in 2016 and finally released in 2019, I didn’t watch The Jesus Rolls until May 2021. I was struck by how beautiful the cinematography was. Every shot is framed with precision and flooded with beautiful light. Cinematographer Frederick Elmes (who previously collaborated with David Lynch, Jim Jarmusch, Mira Nair, and Todd Solondz) really did a wonderful job shooting it. It is, despite some scenes dripping with bisexual lighting, not a noir. It’s a remake of a French sex farce called Going Places (1974). At the time, I called it the most beautiful awful movie I’ve ever seen.

I’ve been thinking about The Jesus Rolls again, even before the condensation on this Royal Rug Pils was dampening my hand. I’ve been trying my best to make sense of it. I watched some other Turturro written and directed movies. First up was Fading Gigolo (2013) starring Turturro and Woody Allen. Turturro is handsome; he works as a florist. He’s good with flowers. “You need a man like Tom Ford or George Clooney,” Turturro’s character says as Allen’s character convinces him to be a sex worker. What a line to write, direct, and perform. After he falls in love with a homely Hasidic woman, he’s unable to perform with Sharon Stone and Sofia Vergara. What a concept to write, direct, and perform. I tried Romance & Cigarettes (2005). After a riveting or at least interesting first few scenes, the movie falls apart despite its stacked cast (James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, and Kate Winslet). There is nothing here for me. There are only outdated and banal observations on the nature of sexuality and the differences between men and women.

I re-watched The Jesus Rolls (twice, once with director’s commentary). I dug into the history of its long production and read as many interviews with Turturro as I could. The deeper I got, the less I liked Turturro. You can hear the distance from reality that happens with celebrities and the wealthy in how he talks about the world and his work. “I’m interested in different kinds of sexuality and what goes on between people, the nuances of it, and how people from different classes, or even lower classes who are not educated, can actually be gentlemen and be interested in the opposite sex. I don’t think that’s usually explored,” he says in one interview. How novel, what if dumb, poor guy nice to woman! On the one scene of bowling in the movie, Turturro says, “I had to do that. I had to give them something.” You can hear the disdain in his voice. His unwillingness to engage with The Big Lebowski on any level might be the most admirable thing about him and this project.

Sometimes, you can almost see the full picture, but enough elements are missing that it is still incomprehensible. They’re out there, lurking around the edges of the shadows. You pore over everything, and you can’t find any meaning. I might now be the world’s foremost expert on a forgotten movie that I don’t like. I have found a few things in it interesting. I offer it some begrudging respect. It doesn’t do me any good. The beer is gone now, except for those last drops that are stuck in the bottom lip of the can forever. Some things will just be stuck forever. Sometimes, someone wants to make a movie and the only way to get funding is to pretend it’s a prequel to a cult hit. Sometimes, there’s a man. The light isn’t so bright anymore, I can look toward the ocean without sunglasses, without squinting. My eyes are open. I’m done, I can watch something else now. The sun is setting. Sometimes, there’s a man.

***

I would like to take this space to publicly apologize to my wife for asking her to sit through all these John Turturro directed movies with me.

Thank you for reading. Disenfranchised will return.