THE BIG KAHUNA

 

FOUR STARS - Profound

 

 

       Few films present our spiritual struggles as authentically as “The Big Kahuna.”  This film is a compelling dialogue between three men sent to a trade convention to make a company-saving sale to the president of a large manufacturing company.

       Having rented the hospitality suite, Phil (Danny DeVito) is the despondent head of marketing for Lodestar Lubricants.  His associate is a cynical and sarcastic veteran salesman named Larry (Kevin Spacey).  The third member of their team is a novice engineer and zealous Baptist with only 9 months with the company named Bob (Peter Facinelli).

       In the genre of a filmed play, director John Swanbeck allows the power of the film to rest on the humanity of these three unlikely co-workers who find themselves on a joint journey of unexpectedly profound spiritual significance.

       Calling their customer the “Big Kahuna,” which is a Hawaiian name for a medicine man or priest, Larry unwittingly establishes the fact that the “Big Kahuna” is not only the job-saving customer he hopes to sign, but is also the primal symbol with whom each of them seek to connect for ultimate meaning and purpose.

       In classic Biblical reverence, the film never shows the face of the “Big Kahuna,” though his impact on their lives is an increasing reality and we identify with their struggles.

       For Larry, making the “sale” is life’s ultimate purpose.  Using profanity and sarcasm to frenetically protect himself from thinking about the deeper issues of life and death, Larry is vulnerable only to the love of his friend Phil. 

       When Phil asks him if he loves him, Larry jokingly asks  what he means by “love” and Phil quotes the words of Jesus:  “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.”

       This call to sacrificial love reaches Larry as he struggles to truly love.

       Bob is threatening to Larry because he is not an avoider of God but a believer and a practicing Baptist.  As such, Bob is convinced that his purpose is to use every opportunity in life, even that of a business convention, to share the truth about Jesus with others.

       Interestingly, it is only Bob who connects with the “Big Kahuna.” 

       Not realizing that their long-awaited client had entered the party, Bob innocently and happily spends the evening sharing his life and faith with him, even being invited to a private party of the “Big Kahuna’s” to further their compelling conversation.

       But in so doing, Bob comes under Larry’s condemnation when he fails to give his co-worker’s business cards to the Kahuna so they can make their sale. 

       Phil suggests to Bob that he is only a religious hustler making a pitch for his religion rather than a true friend.

       This final message is intriguing because it comes from Phil who is the most complex of all three of the characters.  Having recently experienced a divorce, Phil is both empty and dejected.  With fantasies of suicide, Phil admits to Larry that early in his life he had a dream in which he clearly felt that he was on this earth to fulfill a mission for God, but he had never discovered its meaning.  Now, failing in both his business and personal life, he has left behind his arrogance and begun to seek God from a place of humble vulnerability.

       In the end, the “sale” which will save their careers is not made by Larry or Phil, the seasoned salesmen of the company, but by young and inexperienced Bob, who shares his own personal integrity and faith with another human being and wins him over. 

      

(words:  598)

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