Cutter's Way and the Young Dude Adventures
Remember the guy who played the dad in Home Alone? The heavy in Big? Or maybe the crooked cop on Season 2 Soprano's? Who would've thought that at one time he channeled the best of DeNiro-level white heat, bedraggled Warren Oates qualities and something completely "other" to create one of the most original screen characters seen before or since.
At the time of Cutter's Way theatrical release I recall Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert (then in their glory, if memory serves, on PBS) going on and on about actor John Heard's performance as a paraplegic Viet Nam vet. Their unreserved praise seemed then to indicate that they thought Heard himself handicapped and an incredibly gifted thespian. Now I'm not so sure they weren't in on it and question my own pre-teen ability to savvy their gushing.
Regardless, you could still be excused for watching Cutter's Way today and thinking young John Heard the greatest differently-abled actor of his or any other generation. Thus, I feel a need to set the record straight: he had all his limbs and no Lieutenant Dan-level Hollywood magic. The whole thing was done old school, with tape and will power and maybe some secret, high-level Lon Chaney Sr. stuff.
But Jeff Bridges is in it too, and I rarely talk about this movie without mentioning how his Alex Bone is basically the proto-Dude. The dark origin of The Dude. Just why DOES The Dude abide? Maybe because he was a gigolo in his youth and the dream died young. ***magician hands*** There are ways to see this film, and you need to exploit one or more of them, directly.
At the time of Cutter's Way theatrical release I recall Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert (then in their glory, if memory serves, on PBS) going on and on about actor John Heard's performance as a paraplegic Viet Nam vet. Their unreserved praise seemed then to indicate that they thought Heard himself handicapped and an incredibly gifted thespian. Now I'm not so sure they weren't in on it and question my own pre-teen ability to savvy their gushing.
Regardless, you could still be excused for watching Cutter's Way today and thinking young John Heard the greatest differently-abled actor of his or any other generation. Thus, I feel a need to set the record straight: he had all his limbs and no Lieutenant Dan-level Hollywood magic. The whole thing was done old school, with tape and will power and maybe some secret, high-level Lon Chaney Sr. stuff.
But Jeff Bridges is in it too, and I rarely talk about this movie without mentioning how his Alex Bone is basically the proto-Dude. The dark origin of The Dude. Just why DOES The Dude abide? Maybe because he was a gigolo in his youth and the dream died young. ***magician hands*** There are ways to see this film, and you need to exploit one or more of them, directly.
Labels: Jeff Bridges, John Heard, the Big Lebowski, The Dude
posted by lloyd_dobbler at 1:26 PM
3 comments
