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High Fidelity (2000)

© 2000 Touchstone Pictures

Reviewed by DB

In this 2000 movie for vinyl-record lovers, John Cusack plays a record store owner who, due to another breakup (or as the liner on the DVD describes "his needle skips the love groove when his longtime girlfriend walks out on him.") The liner could have also mentioned that Cusack didn't deserve her and she was smart to leave. Following the breakup Cusack reexamines his past loves. Since making top five lists for music is his passion and go-to activity he naturally proceeds to make a list of his top five worst breakups.

Cusack ends up learning a few things about himself including the fact that he wasn't always the dumpee. In the end Laura does take him back so perhaps he learned more than he showed in the movie.

The record store scenes are humorous because of the personalities of the store 'employees' (i.e., Jack Black) and their esoteric and parodied elitist/condesending opinions about records and music.

Overall, the movie is an homage to the local, independent record store which played an important role in popular culture and music for its moment in time.

It seems highly unlikely that there will ever be the reverence for the CD that existed for vinyl records. Streaming has also removed the tactile element of selecting and playing a song. The dominance of streaming and whatever technology comes next surely foretells that vinyl's future will be based even more on record collectors and a niche market.

Cusack refiling his personal record collection by sorting the records "autobiographically" is very innovative. It's true that we all have many songs associated with particular memories and connections. But Cusack is surely unique in his invented methodology.

WATCH the scene of "How to Organize Record Albums" (Touchstone Pictures ©2000).

A comic strip by Bob Thaves in 2024 featured a word-playing record organizational discussion for a music collection with a "New Age" solution.

"Frank & Ernest" by Bob Thaves, The Lincoln Journal, July 14, 2024

And of course, there is the argument in the record store over what music should be played at a funeral:

Top 5 songs about death:

1. "The Leader of the Pack"

2. "Dead Man's Curve"

3. "Tell Laura I Love Her"

4. "One Step Beyond"

5. "You Can't Always Get What You Want," which was immediately disqualified due to it's involvement with The Big Chill so Dick (Todd Luiso) added the "Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" which totally upset Jack Black because it was such a good choice and he hadn't thought of it.

This movie has music, humor and a lot of vinyl. What more could a Friend of the Phonograph want?

Rob holding his two favorites: Laura and Record Albums.