The Empty Cult of 'The Big Lebowski'

The incipient cult of The Big Lebowski was forming before I even saw the movie, and I saw it fairly early on, two or three weeks after its release. I didn’t recognise the signs at the time, but they were there to be read in retrospect — friends badgering me to see it, quoting lines of dialogue to me, bragging that they’d already gone back to see it again. I was primed to join in myself. These were friends I respected, whose movie tastes I generally shared.