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Thursday, August 13, 2009

The Dude would not abide.



Yeah, no. I checked. No mention of Dudeism anywhere in the script. Way to fuck up a classic. There’s already a true sub-culture for the Big Lebowski, so why create a fake one? While the Dudeism wordplay is cute, The Dude zeitgeist never mentioned a specific philosophy or religious label. It’s cool that VW supports indie film and all, but this short from DDB just feels off. Especially when the brand pseudo-channeled nihilist Peter Stormare in previous spots.

(And Sam, sorry I cursed.)

20 comments:

phillybikeboy said...

And what did the Dude drive? An old For Torino (not to be mistaken with Walt Kowalski's Gran Torino). The skeevie little shithead private eye Da Fino drives a VW. Doesn't anybody pay attention anymore?

kevin said...

Gotta love the bathrobe.

Anonymous said...

I could actually see the robe being worn by random people, then they meet up like Close Encounters without ever saying why they're there.

*sigh*

Welcome to the age of literal.

Bill Bittner said...

I understand your objection to the VW ad. But here's my two cents.

The dude is not an uptight ultra-lefty, anarchist, anti-capitalist. He
just didn't give a shit about a lot of things.

And if you think the ad exploits Dude , the movie, and Dudeism, I'd say
relax man. The Dude has nothing against being exploited. Maude
"exploited" him when she collected his seed so she could get pregnant.
The only thing that bothered him was the possiblity that he would have
to be responsible for the child. But once she calmed that fear, he was
perfectly okay.

(And as far as getting it wrong due to DaFino being the one driving the VW, I also say that the dude wouldn't get upset about things like inaccuracy and inconsistency)

Take it easy

Bill

Anonymous said...

Yeah, maybe it's The Dude's fans who are more upset.

;-p

The Dudely Lama said...

What's fake? The Church of the Latter-Day Dude has been around since 2005 and has over 60,000 ordained "Dudeist Priests" all over the world.

http://dudeism.com

This is not a worthy f**king blog post.

Anonymous said...

Swear Lame, you’ll feel better. And reread the f**ing post.

Nowhere in the film is the religion mentioned. Creating one goes against the vibe because it didn't need a label.

Nice logo though.

And the spot is fake and the “religion” cheapened because VW threw a logo on it.

The Dudely Lama said...

Sorry, "worthy f**king adversary" is a line from the movie. I assumed, being so fond of the film, that you might know the lingo.

So why does "Dudeism" have to be in the script to be acceptable? That's stupefying to me.

Your post seems to start in medias res. Perhaps I'm not privy to something? Am I like a child who wanders into the middle of a movie?

Also: "The Dude zeitgeist never mentioned a specific philosophy or religious label" does not make any literal sense -- at least not in English. Care to rephrase your point?

Incidentally we're good pals with the Lebowskifest guys, participated in a recent fest and contributed material to their book a few years ago.

If you don't like the way we roll, that's cool, that's cool. Still, you might want to do a bit more research and editing before you post.

Take er easy.

Anonymous said...

As for the movie and philosophy, you may have missed the point, and I missed that the dude in the film is you.

There's a fine line between implying as the movie does an actual mantra like Dudeism and tipping your hand and actually creating one, something too many brands do when appropriating scenes or music from classic movies. Having the VW logo all over it implied it was just that: A brand-created effort.

Now that I had to dig through a lot of pages to find out that your site Dudeism is the same one in the short and you're the same dude Oliver, it's different, because it's legit having coming from an actual fan, something I always give props for.

Checking out the site before I knew it was one and the same, I could say that I liked the look and feel.

Initially though, it sure looked like a VW-created spoof effort because A) It’s the obvious and heavy-handed shit that brands try and B) There’s no url or other indication in the clip that this wasn’t some brand-created spoof. A url goes a long way to helping a blogger out.

Radar went off though and from a fan POV, here's another brand hijacking pop culture for its own purposes. Hopefully though, you at least cashed a nice check for your efforts.

I'd suggest a better connection between your Dudeism site and the film needed to be established because I'm not the only one who thought this was another lame effort by a brand.

You also mention Lebowskifest though, which I'm pretty sure I mentioned as something cool, but looks like you took that the wrong way too.

Re: research... I tend to write as I go but I do check a lot of stuff. Dudeism wasn't referenced on the Fest main page, rather the links section. Only so much digging I’ll do if people can't make it easy for me. If you know the dudes, then they shouldn't mind posting such a major belief system on their main.

Although, I do tend to ID more with Walter than the Dude, so I got the f**king reference and was throwing it back.

For someone so mellow, you come off so defensive, Dude.

Later.

Bill Bittner said...

F*ck it, Dude, let's go bowling.

By the way, I don't think Dudely is being defensive. He's just explaining things. But, if he is being defensive, don't fault him too much. Dudes aren't perfect. The Dude himself lost his temper many, many times. The key is that in due time, the Dude just lets it all go.

To me they key scene that best illuminates Dudeism is after trying his best to convince the Big Lebowski to pay for the rug, the Dude realizes it's a battle he isn't going to win. So he just says "F*ck it" and leaves. I have adopted such an action in many similar instances, and this has saved me a lot of headaches and brought me much peace of mind.

Anonymous said...

F**k it. Let’s talk Raising Arizona.

The Dudely Lama said...

Thanks Bill. You've understood perfectly. I'm not being overly defensive. And yes, the Dude stuck up for himself until the point that it wasn't worth it anymore.

I just can't win with these amateur bloggers - they can say whatever they want, as smugly and aggressively as they want, but if I come back and with an honest rebuttal, I'm being un-dude about the whole thing. Shoosh. Who's the Nihilist here?

Nevertheless, Dudeism is not Buddhism. We like to engage and throw down intellectually. We just don't do it to the point of exhaustion. And as Bill pointed out, we don't ever let the undude of the world get to us or ruin our day.

MTLB: I understand you've got a job to do and a corner of the internet to defend (as do I), but you might try eating a little crow when you're revealed to have thrown such an resounding gutterball. Your attempt to extricate yourself from this is more contorted and directionless than a worm at a wiggle festival.

The Dudely Lama said...

Sorry, I forgot to point out in the last comment: all you had to do was google "Dudeism" and you would have found it and many links to it right there at the top of the list. That's not so hard.

Nevertheless, in re-reading your last comment I realize that you were trying at least to explain how you misunderstood Dudeism's relationship to the ad, and that is certainly a form of crow-noshing, so kudos (dudos?) to you for that.

However don't ever call me defensive again, goddamnit!

Kidding.

Anonymous said...

Yeaaaah, see, like Walter, I just can’t walk away tho.

“That's not so hard.”

Actually, it is when you look at it from my POV, which is as a dumb consumer/viewer. I see a clip like that and it's just basic experience design to include a url. The more steps you make a person go through to find you, the less chance they stick around. The agency handling it, DDB, should know better.

That part is my job, to notice little shit like that because that's what I get paid for by clients and what we advise them to watch out for, so asshole bloggers like me don't call them on it. ;-p

The blog here is for fun, so no "work" involved btw.

I got your comment too, but the whole novel I wrote before this one explained clearly what I found out after having to go through a few steps, so no gutterball thrown.
7-10 split nailed, imo. Ju kno whatta I mean, mang?

SO how about that Arizona?

;-p

The Dudely Lama said...

Okay, then.

phillybikeboy said...

I love the movie, but the whole "Dudeism" crowd is just as obsessive, sad and lame as the Trekkeis who dress up and learn to speak Klingon.

It's a great fucking movie, but when all is said and done, it's just a movie. Ya'll need to get over yourselves and out more often.

Bill Bittner said...

Why is it so bad to obsess about a movie? Why is obsession over a movie odd, but obesession over sports, video games, cooking, home improvement, gambling, exercising, reading, worshiping, hunting, scrapbooking, stamp collecting, coin collecting, flea markets, working on cars, travel, sex, and fashion perfectly normal?

And don't confuse Dudeism and Lebowski fans. Dudeists are a sub-group of the larger umbrella of Lebowski fans. And if I had to make an educated guess, I would say that the non-Dudeist Lebowski fans are more obsessive than the Dudeists themselves.

And I would hardly say that Dudeists need to get out more. The founder has been all over the world and currently lives in Thailand.

You ever been to Thailand?

phillybikeboy said...

Thank you, Bill Bittner, for demonstrating my point nicely.

And, no, I've never been to Thailand, but I have been shot at in three different time zones and enjoyed a lovely lunch on the West Bank, in the home of a PLO bomb maker. I don't travel much any more....when out on my own I tend to get in trouble.

Bill Bittner said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Bill Bittner said...

Lol.

Well, all this arugment, bickering, namecalling, and hairsplitting just proves that Dudeism MUST be a authentic religion.