My friends were 15 minutes into a movie they were watching, when I walked into their house one Sunday night in the fall of 2000. It turned out not only to be one of the funniest movies I have ever seen, but also one of the movies that carried the most meaning for me.
It was, of course, High Fidelity, the Hollywood (therefore, *slightly* Americanized) version of a novel by English author Nick Hornby adapted into a screenplay by D. V. DeVincentis (who, by the way, was in Grosse Pointe Blank) and directed by Stephen Frears.
The movie stars John Cusack (Grosse Pointe Blank, Better Off Dead, Identity, Being John Malkovich, etc.), one of my favourite actors, as Rob Gordon, a thirty-something bitter musical elitist-cum-record store owner who just broke up with his girlfriend of a few years, Laura (Danish actress Iben Hjejle) This latest break-up starts him wondering - is he doomed to suffer heartbreak, pain, rejection and loss because he listens to pop music, or does he listen to pop music because he undergoes heartbreak, pain, rejection and loss?!
To answer this question and many others, Rob decides to flashback to his past break-ups - in the only way he knows how - by making up a top five list of his ''desert island, all-time top five most memorable break-ups (in chronological order)'': Allison Ashmore (Shannon Stillo), Penny Hardwick (Joelle Carter), Charlie Nicholson (Catherine Zeta-Jones), Jackie Alden and Sarah Kendrew (Lili Taylor), and analysing each and every break-up to find out why he was rejected.
Rejected in spite of trying his best to be a non-conformist during his teenage years, trying to look like Bob Dylan in his college years and like Axl Rose in his twenties, and arranging his records in autobiographical (NOT CHRONOLOGICAL, PHEW!) order in his thirties.
Rob's barely-there record store, Championship Vinyl, is on the corner of Milwaukee St. and Honore St. in Chicago. In his own words, ''[It is in a corner] that attracts the bare minimum of window shoppers. I get by because of the people who make an effort to shop here - mostly single young men who spend their time looking for deleted Smiths singles and Original, not rereleased (underlined) Frank Zappa albums. Fetish properties are not unlike porn. I'd feel sorry for taking their money if I wasn't, well.. kinda one of 'em''.
Rob has two assistants (''I can't fire these guys. I hired them for two nights a week and they started showing up everyday. That was four years ago''), both elitists in their own way. Dick (Todd Luiso) is the nerdy soft-spoken elitist who prefers the Mitch Rider and Detriot Wheels version of Little Latin Lupe Lu while Barry (played by Jack Black, thinks that the Righteous Brothers version is the ONLY good version) is the in-your-face obnoxious kind of elitist who has been trying for seventeen thousand years to get into a band by posting Hip young gunslingers wanted signs in the neighbourhood.
Together, they spend their time at the record store making fun of people who know less about music than they do (''which is everybody''), like the occasional clueless dad looking for a copy of I Just Called To Say I Love You for his daughter's birthday (''There's no way she likes that song... oh, oh, is she in a coma?'') or the geek trying desperately to buy the Beefheart French import Safe As Milk (''Ohh... You know what? I'm not selling this today...''), and making up top five lists for everything. And, for some reason, Rob is sick of it.
After having a few revelations, he decides he would like to meet the girls on his all-time top five break-up list (well, at least those who didn't marry Kevin Bannister and now live in Australia) to ''clear things up''.
Meanwhile, he finds out that Laura is living with their one-time neighbour, Ian Raymond (Tim Robbins) - ''I. Raymond, Ray to his friends, more importantly to his NEIGHBOURS!'' and tries desperately to get in touch with her.
He is initially supported during his latest break-up by mutual friend Liz (I love Jane Cusack, and she tries to be in every movie her brother is in! Good for me)... well, until she talks to Laura (''I get the feeling Laura met with Liz, and some things were said... I don't know what exactly was said, but I can guess that Laura told Liz three, maybe four of all the following pieces of information...'') Rob realizes that he faked the top-five break-up list so that he would believe his latest break-up wasn't as bad on him as it really was (''Maybe you'd sneak into the top ten, but there's no room for you on the top five, sorry.
Those places are reserved for the kind of humiliation and pain you're just not CAPABLE of delivering. If you really wanted to mess me up, you should have got to me EARLIER!'') and now has to find a way to get back with Laura.
But wait - could he really, no, REALLY, spend the rest of his life with someone who doesn't have the same record collection as he does, doesn't share his all of his interests and thoughts on music, and supports BOTH the Isrealis and the Palestinians (by liking BOTH Art Garfunkel and Marvin Gaye)? Or will he end up making compilation tapes to woo newly-discovered women every month? Will his dreams of being surrounded by exotic women's underwear come true?
To answer these questions, and to find out how to make the perfect mix tape for a prospective lover, you should watch one of the funniest films ever, High Fidelity. If you are as much into music as I am or Rob Gordon is, you will love this film.
Jack Black is hilarious (It was only after this movie that he started getting enough publicity as a comedian to get his band, Tenacious D going big, and of course last year there was School of Rock), Todd Luiso plays the geek excellently, Catherine Zeta-Jones was very successful in making me believe that I hated her character (And, for a while, hated her, as well! That's acting!), Tim Robbins in his short role as Ian is very funny (''You know what I'm sayin',... G?'') and don't miss the hilarious one-scene appearance of a very famous rock/folk star.
The soundtrack is really great, my favourite (and now, well-covered) song is Beta Band's Dry The Rain, and there's Jack Black's version of Let's Get It On, too. Even though the ending is definitely predictable and Iben Hjejle's character isn't really developed, I still consider this film on my top five.
I own the VHS, the DVD and the book, have seen the movie about 30 times, and know every line! I give it a 9/10!
