good movie with great soundtrack

Rating: 8/10 (9 February 2002)

John Cusack stars as Rob, the owner of Championship Vinyl, which is a record store. It's where he and his two employees, Dick and Barry, hang out during the day. Rob has recently been dumped by his girlfriend, Laura while Dick and Barry seem never to have had one - prefering records over girls. On the surface the film is a romantic comedy of Rob getting back with Laura, but really at heart its a glimpse into the male pysche through a love of music. I'm sure we are all familiar (and may indeed see ourselves) with guys retreating into their world of music snobbery, attacking each others' "top five" music lists of all-time, etc!
Involved in this project from the outset, and credited as co-producer and co-writer, Cusack spends much of the time doing speeches direct to camera, talking to us in his lonely apartment, on the way down the stairs, out on the street and all the way up to the shopfront - speeches taken almost word for word from Nick Hornby's book. Some might see this coming off a bit uneasy, a self-conconscious gimmick that director Stephen Frears could have done without, but I dont think it diminishes from the film much (actually as the film progresses and the action gets more complicated, this narration gets toned down a bit)
As for the other main characters , Iben Hjelje shines as the very likeable Laura, Robs nice, accessible and down-to-to-earth girlfriend, Jack Black starring as Barry is simply superb and Todd Louiso is good as Dick - a character who fits the stereotype of a fan of relatively obscure (in the US at least) Glasgow indie band 'Belle and Sebastian'. Such musical 'in-jokes' are littered throughout the film - such as like the advert for some "hip young gunslingers" - a reference to a semi-famous advert placed for new writers in the New Musical Express in its heyday in the late 1970s and Punk and later New Wave was breaking. Its obvious the makers of this film care deeply about their music! If you are also a music fan, then there are parts of this film that you will simply love and the soundtrack is great also. However for those not so interested in music, the film may drag a bit and you wont be able to relate to the characters so well.
However to me its definitely in my top 5 films of 1990s books