empire rancid

Rating: Null/10 (29 August 2003)

i understand that this movie has a lot of cult fanatics, and perhaps, if i was a bored, angst ridden teen with zero exposure to any other half decent film in 1995 (i was 22), i woulda loved it, but as it stands, i have a certain degree of taste and have seen several films, and i like to think i know what constitues good cinema, and this was far far far from good cinema. it was very self-consciously "cute", and self-congratulatory. it was virtually plotless, felt like a sitcom, with one dimensional characters and tedious dance sequences to bad grungy mid-nineties rock. it suddenly hit me that i was wasting my time watching this flick, so i promptly shut it off two thirds of the way in. it was so smarmy and bland and the characters were so, "lookit me, ma, i'm hip". i was really annoyed. the rex character was interesting, and the bald chick had potential, but that's as far as it goes, really. i agree with the others. watch high fidelity, which is far more clever and interesting and well made. it comes closer to art than this piece of bland mass entertainment. i couldn't begin to describe the problems with this. all i can really say is that the girl who lent this to me says it's her favourite movie and was insulted that i shut it off. she also didn't appreciate "my night at maud's" (french intelligent filmmaking at it's close to finest). what can i say. different strokes for different folks.