Chris Knight asks: Did we really need a second coming of this Jesus?
Jesus is risen.
Last seen in the Coen brothers’ 1998 comedy The Big Lebowski, John Turturro’s foul-mouthed bowling phenom Jesus Quintana now stars in his own film, written and directed by Turturro himself.
Make no mistake; this is not a sequel. There are dudes in The Jesus Rolls – Bobby Cannavale as his best friend; Jon Hamm as his nemesis; a host of celebrity cameos – but no Dude. And for all the sensual excesses, no one orders a White Russian.
Turturro has apparently been keen to make this second coming for years, but the Coens have declared they will never make a bigger Lebowski. So he convinced them to sign the character over to him. I’m guessing it cost 30 pieces of silver.
But the result adds little to the already spotty record of movies in which secondary characters take the lead – see Minions, Get Him to the Greek, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, etc. The film opens with Jesus finishing a stint in jail; the warden (Christopher Walken) reminds him that one more strike is great when you’re on the prison bowling team, but not when you’re on parole.
I’ll say this for the movie; all those three-ways save a lot of time.
Ignoring this advice, Jesus and his main man Petey (Cannavale) steal a car and, in short order, the French girlfriend (Audrey Tautou) of its owner (Hamm). This might be a good time to mention that The Jesus Rolls also functions as a loose remake of the 1974 French film Les Valseuses, though in that one the woman is kidnapped rather than emancipated.
In most other respects the film’s sexual mores haven’t aged well. Tautou’s character is a two-dimensional bundle of quirks whose sole goal in life is to experience an orgasm; the film begs the question of whether you need a man for that. But she finally fulfills her quest with Pete Davidson’s character, whose wardrobe – ill-fitting tan suit, silver valise – makes him look like another refugee from the Coens’ oeuvre.
Then there’s Susan Sarandon, who shares a meal with Jesus and Petey, and says the only way she can thank them is in the bedroom. I’ll say this for the movie; all those three-ways save a lot of time. The whole thing is over is about 85 minutes.
The film’s picaresque structure replicates the broad feel of a Coen brothers’ movie without managing to crack their screenwriting genius or narrative intricacy. About the nearest The Jesus Rolls comes to a clever case of mistaken identity is when Petey and Jesus accidentally steal the same car twice.
After one of his less than successful sexual forays, Jesus wept. But I wasn’t moved. The signature line from The Big Lebowski – handily repeated at least twice in this movie – is “Nobody f—s with the Jesus!” It’s a lesson Turturro should perhaps have taken to heart.
The Jesus Rolls opens Feb. 28 in Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver; Feb. 29 in Calgary; March 6 in Saskatoon; and March 15 in Kitchener.
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Source:nationalpost.com
