Lebowski, Sigur, McDunnough, Whitman

Well I can't get the images to sync up the way i want so fuck it!

       So what do Lebowski, Sigur, McDunnough and Whitman have in common? Well they all belong to narrative structures that are trying to figure out what American life is all about. Whitman is the creator of one of those narratives and the other three are the created.. 

So lets get into some sweet deets. I won't lie to you, it has been a while since i have seen these three movies, but i got an iron trap upstairs and i have seen them many a time.

Instead of boring you with an in depth analysis of each character or at least a analysis of what they represent i am gonna lump it together. If you have questions or want me to expand on a train of thought, comment. 

The Cohens choose stories that try to explain and shape america. In "Raising Arizona" we see a common lower class family trying to be a family. They get mixed up with the higher classes and hijinks happen. Raising Arizona is really a commentary on class, and social structure in america. It also explores the facets of wealth and life and how to live in the country with next to nothing. 

This same thing is explicated in "The Big Lebowski. The significance of money is played up, class warfare is played up, and different ideas of identity are played up. Lebowski is a symposium of the clashing of american values and ideas of the 20 years leading up to it. Vietnam, desert storm, nihilism, bad art, the eighties. It is a spewing forth of that esoteric culture that comes from the insanely rich and the insanely poor that inhabit the desert down by that shady oasis they call L.A.

No Country for Old Men is true to the book written by McCarthy. But even then, and this is why i add this, even then it is simply a study on how the world is changing. How America is no longer simple, and no longer pure, but instead has horrors in the night. Money, once again plays a large roll. Antone Sigur represents the ultimate unknowlable. The ultimate other. Foriegn, powerful, malicious, deadly and sadistic he has his own code of laws he sticks to. His morality is not ours. It is a movie (and book) of accepting that we cannot know everything. That things change and leave us behind.. 

So what does this have to do with Whitman?

Whitman tried to capture all of America, and so do the Cohens. 

Sure if you are a base degenerate you think about how Lebowski loafs and leans. Sure that's a point to make. Yet more poignant is that Lebowski navigates a land of delusional and shifting America. He tires to live his life his own way, a very American way, but the horrors of war have split his nation. He is Whitmanian in that sense (post civil war). Furthermore he collects aspects of America around him on his journey, The Rich, the abstract artist, the Vietnam vet, the bowling buddy, the fledgling dancing landlord, all these characters and caricatures of hope.

Raising Arizona is a play on the nuculer family. No Country is a haunting look at the dark under belly of corporate greed and violence.

All these things emobdy America, and thats what Whitman tried to do.

Im sorry, but i am done for today. No Editing. Sorry if it is sloppy. Good day,