So, must of us obsessive collectors of the recorded sound have to put up with “Hey, have you ever seen High Fidelity? You’re just like that guy!” comments roughly once every three weeks. And, considering most of us critics would rather give “D12 World” a positive review than praise anything remotely connected to Nick “Me So” Hornby, the main figure of representation we’ve had on the big screen in recent years has been Steve Buscemi as Seymour in Terry Zwigoff’s “Ghost World” (2000). I’m suffering from insomnia, so I’ve just watched the film twice in a row. And… well, it’s a little too accurate for my liking.
The point of the entire film seems to be that Seymour is obviously a very wrong individual. “Ghost World” seems to be a kind of purgatory that Enid enters when she meets Seymour for the first time, and one she can only escape by putting as much distance between her and him as possible. In the process of the movie, he costs Enid her friendship with her best friend, and cuts off his first actual meaningful relationship with a woman for four years for no real reason. He goes to a psychiatrist, and appears to be dominated by his mother. He’s incapable of conducting conversations with anyone.
“Ghost World” functions as a contemporary take on “The Catcher In The Rye”, the “everything sucks” protagonist (NB: I’d take John Bender over Holden Caulfield any day of the week) may seem appealing to someone of a certain age, but when you distance yourself from it by years… well, as Enid herself says “God, think about that… that’s actually totally depressing”. “Everything sucks” is not an acceptable worldview. The only character in the movie with any sense of optimism, Norman, eventually gets his reward: the bus comes. It’s pretty obvious where our sympathies are supposed to lie: nowhere.
Even so, the insights into the world of the “in too deep” music fan are pretty accurate. Take the painfully on-point representation of the vinyl trading party:
JEROME
There are some records I will pay serious money for, provided they’re
a sincere V plus. Other than that I’d prefer to just have them on CD.
STEVEN
CDs will never have the presence of an original 78.
JEROME
WRR-ONG! A digital transfer adequately mastered will sound
identical to the original. Do you have a decent equalizer?
STEVEN
I have a Klipsch 2B3.
JEROME
Obviously the problem! You expect a ten-band equalizer to impart state of-the-art sound? Dream a little dream! etc…
And, sure, you can argue that “High Fidelity” does this as well, but… John Cusack loves The Clash. Enid loves The Buzzcocks. It’s not even a fucking contest.