HIGH FIDELITY (2000)
Grade: B+
Director: Stephan Fears
Screenplay: D.V DeVincentis, Steve Pink, John Cusack, Scott Rosenberg
Starring: John Cusack, Iben Hjejle, Jack Black, Todd Louiso, Lisa Bonet, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Tim Robbins, Natasha Gregson Wagner, Sara Gilbert, Joelle Carter
John Cusack is the kind of actor who seems to effortlessly slide into his respective film roles. So effortlessly that people tend to forget he's there, much in the way people rarely recall many of the great character actors (anyone who can put the name James Rebhorn with that actor's face is invited to treat themselves to a product from one of my sponsors). Example: The other day my mother asked me (the expert, of course) if there were any movies out worth seeing, never mind that our tastes couldn't be more divergent--- I'll never forget the day she recommended that I go see A NIGHT AT THE ROXBURY for god sakes, and to be fair she was mightily pissed at me for telling her that GO! was a lot of fun (which it is), so I didn't see this as anything more than a futile attempt at conversation. I muttered, with a little trepidation, that she might enjoy HIGH FIDELITY. She responded with her usual query," Whose in that one?" This is a question whose answer that seems to immediately conjure up the kind of movie you went to see. If the reply is Julia Roberts you probably assume it was something wispy and light, a Sylvester Stallone movie and you picture a bloodbath with few words and much involuntary bicep flexing, and a Woody Allen movie means hyper articulate white people (usually of the Jewish faith) fretting about in some Upper East Side palace. Anyway, when I answered "John Cusack", she replied with a rather stunned "Who?", as if it was unreasonable for her to know whom I was referring to.
Now I know for a fact that my mother has seen several Cusack movies, most recently BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and PUSHING TIN, but I suppose it's understandable that she would not recognize the name, after all, for most, names are tougher than faces. I showed her a picture of Cusack's mug in the paper hoping for an "Oh - him, yes he's quite good" instead I got a "No - I don't know him". At this point I was way beyond frustration into a realm of nose hair yanking anger (yes, filmic ignorance is all it takes to get me into the nose hair pulling zone), till I realized something: I doubt that much of America would recognize Cusack's relatively bland visage, or even the name which is rather bland compared to the coolness of a Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise, one-syllable names that glide off the tongue with the velocity of a speeding car.
Cu-sack. Cu-sack - no, not quite as cool. I'm sure that twenty years from now Cusack will forever be referred to as "the guy from (add in the Cusack film of your choice)". He's not a brand name, and his movies usually aren't big moneymakers, but in his own unassuming way he's kind of a genius.
With his pleasant, common man looks, and charming semi-articulate blatherings he has become one of the most likeable romantic leading men of the 90's. From THE SURE THING to SAY ANYTHING Cusack has merged the talents of early Tom Hanks and early Jack Lemmon. Despite the fact that nearly every character he plays is a variation of the character before it (the schlumpy every man), he's a constantly enjoyable screen persona, like Albert Brooks or Woody Allen. And he knows how to chose scripts, while the Stephan Baldwin's and Val Kilmer's seem to put them selves in everything (the former actually had the insight to follow up Oscar winner USUAL SUSPECTS with a Pauly Shore vehicle, and judging from his latest projects it looks like he still has yet to fire his agent), Cusack generally picks rewarding projects (save for the unwatchable HOT PURSUIT, a 1988 film also featuring a young Ben Stiller).
HIGH FIDELITY is his second collaboration with hit or miss English director Stephan Fears (THE GRIFTERS, THE HI-LO COUNTRY), and it's a hit. It was also co-written by Cusack, and some of his collaborators on the terrific comedy, GROSSE POINT BLANK. It's not quite as entertaining or as funny as that film, but as it progresses in its meandering fashion, the movie cast something of a spell over me. HIGH FIDELITY begins as a hipster ode to the non-committal Rob, a vinyl record store owner, who opens the film by breaking down the fourth wall with much abandon and educating us in his "top 5 break ups list". This is something Cusack does the entire film a la FERRIS BUELLER'S DAY OFF. At first the talking-directly-into-the-camera-schtick had me vaguely annoyed, mostly because it reminded me so much of the film BODY SHOTS which used a similar conceit, but it began to grow on me due almost entirely to Cusack's witty delivery. He's the kind of guy we don't mind talking directly to us.
Gradually the film settles into a SHAMPOO-like tragi-comic character study, of a guy who must confront himself and his personal failures in order to figure out the true person he is (yes it's all very existential). Though that plot-line is mostly enjoyable, the thing I liked the most about the film is how much pleasure it offers in introducing us to minor characters, all of whom (now this is really something) are terrific enough to warrant their own films.
The best of which is Jack Black (of the very funny show TENACIOUS D, a program that sadly went the way of Bruce Willis' hair…unfortunately that annoying smirk remains), an ardent record store employee who bullies customers into buying exactly what he wants them to buy. He's the kind of guy I'm sure we've all met before, a blowhard who thinks he's always right and will do anything in his power (be it yell, argue, insult) to hoist his opinion onto others. But I like this guy, because of how Black plays him. The actor is portly with a round baby face and crazy eyes, but despite his size he leaps to and fro like a manic speed freak (which might be a bit of a redundant description, seeing as how all the speed freaks I know are manic). He's the kind of supporting character who would be impossibly annoying comic relief in most other films. (Look at what that hack Jan de Bont did to poor Phillip Seymour Hoffman in TWISTER). But Fears and Black never let that happen. The character, for all his shucking and jiving is steeped in reality. He's over the top, but in a way we can all probably relate to.
Catherine Zeta-Jones, in her brief role, gives a vivid portrayal of a women completely enamored with her own "charm". Tim Robbins registers in an even tinier part as a New Age-type, a character played entirely for cartoon yuks, but still manages to work its desired comic effect. The one exception in the acting department is a bit of a doozy, the main love interest played by Danish actress Iben Hjejle (MIFUNE), who completely obliterates any trace of a Danish accent, replacing it with a stilted American phonation. I give her kudos for attempting such a contradictory role, but instead of being likeable, she comes across as rather robotic, and as such it's hard to see why Cusack's character would be so obsessed with her especially when he has a beautiful, intelligent writer (Natasha Gregson Wagner) potentially waiting in the wings. This reminded me of SAY ANYTHING, where the charming Cusack was paired with the charmless Ione Skye, and in MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL where the poor bastard had to put up with Alison Eastwood (whose unbelievably more wooden then father, Clint for those "special people" whose wheels turn a little slower). In fact Cusack is rarely paired up with a personality that matches his, though I'd bet that if Laura and Natasha switched roles, the result would be more effective.
HIGH FIDELITY works almost entirely on the strength of its characters and performances. Fears' direction is somewhat stilted, and the script is sometimes a little too (and this is a word I'm beginning to hate to use but alas I must) quirky for its own good (I think I'll blame that on Scott Rosenberg, who judging from what he did with BEAUTIFUL GIRLS, CON AIR, and THINGS TO DO IN DENVER WHILE YOUR DEAD, has his fingerprints all over the most irritating bits of this movie). But Cusack really does deserve an award, for being so damn…Cusackian. I'm afraid that his talents are so understated that he may have to wait till his hip needs replacing to be offered such an award worthy of his considerable talent. His character, Rob (whose sort of like an older, more bitter Lloyd from SAY ANYTHING) is funny and tragic without being pathetic, and that Cusack can do all this, and still not imprint himself onto the minds of most audiences, is something of an achievement.
http://www.geocities.com/incongruity98 Reeling (Ron Small)
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