The Dude (Jeff Bridges) has a few important chats with Sam Elliot’s The Stranger, but what is the significance of his role in The Big Lebowski?
There’s no mistaking the dulcet tones that open The Big Lebowski, but there’s a point to Sam Elliot’s The Stranger that’s bigger than pleasant narration. One of the Coen Brothers most irreverent movies involves The Dude (Jeff Bridges) suffering from a case of mistaken identity in which Jeffrey Lebowski, The Big Lebowski in question, is being targeted by nefarious criminals. When the real Lebowski makes it The Dude’s job to clean up the mess and rescue his kidnaped wife, he enlists the help of his irascible veteran pal Walter (John Goodman) and gentle Donny (Steve Buscemi) to ensure that the randsom payment goes off without a hitch.
Throughout The Dude’s brush with Nihilists, an eccentric painter named Maude (Julianne Moore), and the adult entertainment industry, he returns time and again to his home away from home, the bowling alley where him and his friends tackle the ephemeral uncertainties of life. Seated beside him is The Stranger, a mysterious man who manages to stand out in The Big Lebowski’s cast of characters, always generating more questions than answers. His presence isn’t just fun set dressing, though, and there’s a deeper meaning that coincides with The Dude’s philosophical tendencies.
Sam Elliot’s Stranger Narrates The Big Lebowski To Represent The Dude’s Conscious
The Dude speaks his mind pretty clearly throughout The Big Lebowski, but The Stranger acts as his conscience, often acting as the Devil’s advocate in situations where The Dude could use another perspective. The Dude has the figurative “devil” and “angel” on his shoulder already between Walter and Donny, but debates with Walter end in the latter screaming and drawing his firearm, and suggestions from Donny are meek and unfocused. The Stranger cuts through all the ridiculousness of The Big Lebowski and helps The Dude get to the point of the vagaries of life.
The Dude likes to philosophize and consider all angles of a problem, rather than go with a knee-jerk reaction like his pals. The Stranger offers a way for him to sit back and, like the audience joining The Dude on his adventure, understand his purpose in a story much larger than himself. The Dude has never had a life of purpose, other than to exist in the way he prefers, and suddenly needing to be of use to others, even be responsible for their well-being, is something he’s not equipped to handle emotionally on his own without The Stranger’s helpful intervention.
Is The Stranger God In The Big Lebowski?
While there are theories about whether The Stranger is imaginary and a figment of The Dude’s imagination, a more popular theory suggests that The Stranger might even be God. He opens The Big Lebowski and also brings the movie to a close while discussing The Dude’s story, and even offers a moral assessment for his trials and tribulations. To add to his righteous demeanor, The Stranger isn’t fond of The Dude’s slacking nature, and he doesn’t care for his use of profanity, indicating that he might at the very least be associated with a more devout way of life.
Another clue might reside in the final scene in the movie when, just before The Stranger leaves the bowling alley, he parts with, “Take it easy, Dude. I know that you will,” to which The Dude replies with one of the film’s most-quoted lines. There’s a Biblical meaning to what “The Dude abides” means hidden in the Ecclesiastes scripture: “One generation goeth, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth for ever.” Perhaps The Stranger, like an omnipresent, omnipotent Almighty, just wanted to make sure that while Earthly kingdoms might rise and fall, the ground they’re built on is a constant and unchanging thing, like The Dude himself.