Yuck

Rating: 3/10 (12 April 2005)

I was excited to see Empire Records for the first time a few years ago. I had several friends and acquaintances who raved about it and I was more than impressed to see Toad the Wet Sprocket and Gin Blossoms on the soundtrack. Talk about being disappointed. This is a dull film with little merit beyond the obvious appeal of its idle fantasy. "We're young and we have problems but we stick together and straighten ourselves out with a party" seems to be the single puerile point this movie drives for.
The characters are almost without exception completely unlikable and poorly developed (although the bald girl is rather cool). One character blows all the record store's money at the beginning of the film, no reason given. Liv Tyler wants to sleep with her aging pop idol and elicits no sympathy. Zellweger actually does sleep with him and elicits even less. I wanted to slap them both. The artist with the coins in the floor is in love with Liv but I just wished he would see how impossibly stupid she was and date someone else. Maybe the bald girl, since she was the film's single redeeming character (and that's not saying much).
Worst of all is the erratic, potentially mentally ill manager played by Anthony LaPaglia. This is by no means a criticism of fine actor Anthony, but his character is appallingly written, shifting from nurturing and understanding father figure to angry and psychotic manager type between - and even within - scenes. Nothing about the film feels consistent or worth caring about.
If you want to watch a good film about music try High Fidelity or Almost Famous, where the characters are actually entertaining and well written and the stories not the stuff of ridiculous adolescent fantasy.