The Jesus Rolls: Ambitious Big Lebowski Spinoff (and Oddball Remake) Aims High, Lands Low

By Thom Ernst

Rating: C-

In The Jesus Rolls, John Turturro reprises his scene-stealing turn as the ball-licking, hair-netted, long finger-nailed, Jesus Quintana from the Coen Brother’s bowling opus, The Big Lebowski.

I count The Big Lebowski among my list of flawless films. But, unlike many who share equal affections for Lebowski, the idea of a feature film focusing on one of its most memorable characters is more agitating than enthralling. The risk factor is too great.

The Big Lebowski so perfectly grounds Quintana in its own myth of time and place. If more Quintana was needed, the Coen Brothers would have given us more Quintana. Regrettably, The Jesus Rolls renders Jesus Quintana as needy as the dozens of SNL skits that have crashed beneath the weight of a character striving for more exposure.

I’d feel differently if the film were in the hands of the Coen Brothers —or over-seen by the Coen Brothers. It isn’t. The Jesus Rolls is merely a project the Coen brothers sanctioned, and that sounds less like a confident offering of their blessing and more like friends appeasing a friend.

And the one thing Turturro has going for him is an abundance of friends willing to appease. Bobby Cannavale, Audrey Tautou, Tim Blake Nelson, Jon Hamm, Susan Sarandon, Christopher Walken, Pete Davidson, and Sonia Braga all lend their talents to greater and (mostly) lesser degrees of success.

Davidson effectively buries any SNL buffoonery in a surprisingly dramatic performance as a charming ex-con with vicious potential. Sarandon also succeeds beyond the material as a recently released prisoner reveling in her newfound freedom. Braga outshines them all as Quintana’s prostitute mother — a woman who, like Braga herself, defies all perceptions of age and beauty.

Less successful are Cannavale and Tautou, unfortunate since they make up much of the screen time. Cannavale, as Quintana’s friend Petely, flounders in his efforts to maintain a heightened state of doofus-laden confusion. Tautou suffers trying to recapture her waif-like turn in Amélie (2001) by way of a free-spirited woman in search of her first orgasm.

This all sounds like a terrible slight against Turturro, who not only created Jesus Quintana through his own creative ingenuity but has made several feature films of his own. I happen to appreciate Romance & Cigarettes, Turturro’s shot at a blue-collar juke-box musical. But without the Coen Brothers attached, it’s tough to imagine The Jesus Rolls as anything more than a vanity project.

The Jesus Rolls isn’t just a spin-off. It’s also a remake. The film credits the characters and stories of Bertrand Blier despite being a near plot-by-plot reimagining of his 1974 film, Going Places (aka Les Valseuses). I can’t say I ever bought into Blier’s defense of Going Places as a landmark film designed to challenge the boundaries of respectability and moral ambiguity, nor have I accepted the film on the terms that it’s a satirical discourse on toxic masculinity.

To me, Blier’s film has always been more exploitive than daring. And, to paraphrase the late Roger Ebert, “Going Places is one of the most misogynistic films I’ve ever seen.”

Turturro primarily plays to Blier’s lead stopping short of out-right misogyny, and yet, I think that Going Places is by far the better film. Some uncomfortable scenes remain, notably when Jesus and a Petey sidle alongside a woman nursing her child, commenting not just on her race (African-American) and good looks, but offering up, in creepy detail, their own past sexual exploits. The moment strives for a kind of quaint inappropriate naïve decency in the hopes of presenting Jesus and Petey as an affable pair of lunkheads.

The movie does surprise by serving up an implied if not courageous stance when depicting sexual fluidity. But then it falters by explaining away the accusations (established in The Big Lebowski) of Quintana being a pedophile, by use of a flashback that is far too flippant to be anything but a narrative cheat.

It’s not so much whether The Jesus Rolls fails. It does, but how much it fails depends on how amped up your expectations are going into the movie. If I had expected more from the film, then my disgruntlement would be close to unmanageable. As it is, I comfortably walk away from The Jesus Rolls feeling that I’ve broke even. And Jesus Quintana? I choose to always (and only) remember the eccentric bowler I saw in The Big Lebowski. No more. No less.

The Jesus Rolls. Directed by John Turturro. Starring John Turturro, Bobby Cannavale, Audrey Tautou, Pete Davidson, Susan Sarandon, Christopher Walken, and Jon Hamm. Opens in theatres February 28 and on VOD March 10.