so i had to write an essay for comp.... and i did it on John Cusak
“But whenever I meet dynamic, nonretarded Americans, I notice that they all seem to share a single unifying characteristic: the inability to experience the kind of mind-blowing, transcendental romantic relationship they perceive to be a normal part of living. And someone needs to be blamed for this. So instead of blaming no one for this… or everyone… I’m going to blame John Cusak”
~Chuck Klosterman
We as “civilized” human beings are raised to believe in this non-existent miraculous experience of love. (Klosterman) Love has become one of the most basic needs. Wikipedia describes the Western notion of romantic love as something that must “take you by surprise.” Movies like High Fidelity enforce this definition and love as a cultural statute of by blinding viewers with constant reminders of ultra romanticism. Society as a whole has been sucked into this need for romantic love and we can not escape it.
The learning process of romantic love is instilled in people since childhood, every little girl is Sleeping Beauty and life is the evil witch and someday Prince Charming will come, in this case Prince Charming is John Cusak. In Chuck Klosterman’s novel Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs he explains that he feels that he is in constant competition with Cusak as defined by “a two dimensional projection, pretending to be characters that don’t actually exist.”(Klosterman, 2) Additionally he assumes this to be the plight of most men interested in “women born between 1965 and 1978.”(Klosterman, 2) Klosterman goes on to explain that people are not in love with John Cusak or the relationships he has, they are in love with his characters and the relationships his characters have. In this case people are jealous of Rob Gordon and Laura. Even within the confines of the movie people are jealous of John Cusak, or Rob rather. In a scene after Laura leaves, one of Rob’s employees, Dick, goes to visit Rob at his apartment. Rob is reorganizing his records not chronologically but in “autobiographical” order. Dick’s short response of “no fucking way,” makes it clear that this overly sensitive music snob is not even average in the fake world created by this movie. Dick is not just jealous of Rob’s record collection, he is jealous of Rob’s entire outlook on life. Rob always gets the girl, no matter what he says it happens and Dick wants that. The ordering of records is just a medium to show how many girls Rob has actually been madly in love with.
The movie, as well as Klosterman’s novel is centered on this semi-modern idea of the mix tape. When Rob first falls for Laura he makes her a mix-tape. Later in the movie, he is about to make another girl a mix tape when he realizes that he is “truly in love” with Laura. Finally High Fidelity ends with Rob realizing that he’s never made Laura a mix tape that took her feelings into account and he starts thinking of the perfect order of songs to win her heart forever. This form of winning over girls transfers over to real life. In an NPR interview Rob Sheffield, author of Love is a Mix Tape, explains how his whole life is based on the idea of a mix tape. This of course flows into his love life; “the first time I fell in love I made my first falling in love tape and the first time I got broken up with I made my first I just got dumped tape.”(NPR) The interview continues and we find out the tragic story of this real life Rob. He meets and falls in love with a real life Laura over a Lynard Skynard song. Tragically she died young, soon after their marriage. When they met, he picked her up by saying “I’ll make you a mix tape.” Ironically this is the same pick up line Rob Gordon used. This form of mix tape love, better known as fake love in Klosterman’s novel is unattainable. Klosterman closes his John Cusak chapter with a final statement. “I want fake love. But that’s all I want, and that’s why I can’t have it.”(Klosterman, 10) Humans are constantly striving for something they can never achieve. The reason movies like High Fidelity are made is to somewhat ease the mind of a growing mass of people whose life depends on the idea of fake love actually existing.
When Laura leaves Rob she moves in with this Ian guy who “listens to world music” and wears “rings on his fingers.” Ian immediately becomes Robs enemy. Rob sees the two having the most mind-blowing sex in all of history. He is supprisingly, not upset that she could so easily have fall for another man. He consintrates solely on the physical. Every argument they have is about her and Ian’s physical relationship. He never asks if she loves him or if shes happy, he only asks if they’ve had sex yet. This leads one to wonder. What do all these women that Klosterman refers to want. It becomes easy to ignore the post-breakup Rob because the make-up sex Rob is so appealing. Laura almost glazes over this horribly spiteful and uncaring Rob just to be with him again. Do the women that Klosterman date actually want this? Perhaps they just think they do.
Another commen thread throughout the movie is “top-five lists.” In the real world, with only a few acceptions everyone’s top five lists contain fall in love. They don’t think about the second part, they just assume that the person they fall in love with will in return fall in love with them back. The Mr. T Experience song “I fell for you” enforces this idea with the chorus of “I fell for you when I saw you there, and it's only fair that you fall for me too.” The desire to be loved back is brought up again and again and intertwines all forms of media that deal with the idea of love. Klosterman too is stuck in this idea that he wants to be able to control other peoples emotions. Rob convinces Laura to love him again, why can’t normal 3-demensional people do the same?
Two point five kids and tape deck full of cheesey mix tapes has become the American Dream. Movies like High Fedelity have convinced us that if are not in a relationship based on Klosterman’s “fake love” we can not be happy. We have become a very needy society, in need of the constant reminder that we are loved and that someone cares about us, and we have decided the best way for this to be “love” to be proven is through mix-tape. We want to belive that Rob and Laura stay together forever, because we want to believe that if that really happened in real life that it would work out.
~Chuck Klosterman
We as “civilized” human beings are raised to believe in this non-existent miraculous experience of love. (Klosterman) Love has become one of the most basic needs. Wikipedia describes the Western notion of romantic love as something that must “take you by surprise.” Movies like High Fidelity enforce this definition and love as a cultural statute of by blinding viewers with constant reminders of ultra romanticism. Society as a whole has been sucked into this need for romantic love and we can not escape it.
The learning process of romantic love is instilled in people since childhood, every little girl is Sleeping Beauty and life is the evil witch and someday Prince Charming will come, in this case Prince Charming is John Cusak. In Chuck Klosterman’s novel Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs he explains that he feels that he is in constant competition with Cusak as defined by “a two dimensional projection, pretending to be characters that don’t actually exist.”(Klosterman, 2) Additionally he assumes this to be the plight of most men interested in “women born between 1965 and 1978.”(Klosterman, 2) Klosterman goes on to explain that people are not in love with John Cusak or the relationships he has, they are in love with his characters and the relationships his characters have. In this case people are jealous of Rob Gordon and Laura. Even within the confines of the movie people are jealous of John Cusak, or Rob rather. In a scene after Laura leaves, one of Rob’s employees, Dick, goes to visit Rob at his apartment. Rob is reorganizing his records not chronologically but in “autobiographical” order. Dick’s short response of “no fucking way,” makes it clear that this overly sensitive music snob is not even average in the fake world created by this movie. Dick is not just jealous of Rob’s record collection, he is jealous of Rob’s entire outlook on life. Rob always gets the girl, no matter what he says it happens and Dick wants that. The ordering of records is just a medium to show how many girls Rob has actually been madly in love with.
The movie, as well as Klosterman’s novel is centered on this semi-modern idea of the mix tape. When Rob first falls for Laura he makes her a mix-tape. Later in the movie, he is about to make another girl a mix tape when he realizes that he is “truly in love” with Laura. Finally High Fidelity ends with Rob realizing that he’s never made Laura a mix tape that took her feelings into account and he starts thinking of the perfect order of songs to win her heart forever. This form of winning over girls transfers over to real life. In an NPR interview Rob Sheffield, author of Love is a Mix Tape, explains how his whole life is based on the idea of a mix tape. This of course flows into his love life; “the first time I fell in love I made my first falling in love tape and the first time I got broken up with I made my first I just got dumped tape.”(NPR) The interview continues and we find out the tragic story of this real life Rob. He meets and falls in love with a real life Laura over a Lynard Skynard song. Tragically she died young, soon after their marriage. When they met, he picked her up by saying “I’ll make you a mix tape.” Ironically this is the same pick up line Rob Gordon used. This form of mix tape love, better known as fake love in Klosterman’s novel is unattainable. Klosterman closes his John Cusak chapter with a final statement. “I want fake love. But that’s all I want, and that’s why I can’t have it.”(Klosterman, 10) Humans are constantly striving for something they can never achieve. The reason movies like High Fidelity are made is to somewhat ease the mind of a growing mass of people whose life depends on the idea of fake love actually existing.
When Laura leaves Rob she moves in with this Ian guy who “listens to world music” and wears “rings on his fingers.” Ian immediately becomes Robs enemy. Rob sees the two having the most mind-blowing sex in all of history. He is supprisingly, not upset that she could so easily have fall for another man. He consintrates solely on the physical. Every argument they have is about her and Ian’s physical relationship. He never asks if she loves him or if shes happy, he only asks if they’ve had sex yet. This leads one to wonder. What do all these women that Klosterman refers to want. It becomes easy to ignore the post-breakup Rob because the make-up sex Rob is so appealing. Laura almost glazes over this horribly spiteful and uncaring Rob just to be with him again. Do the women that Klosterman date actually want this? Perhaps they just think they do.
Another commen thread throughout the movie is “top-five lists.” In the real world, with only a few acceptions everyone’s top five lists contain fall in love. They don’t think about the second part, they just assume that the person they fall in love with will in return fall in love with them back. The Mr. T Experience song “I fell for you” enforces this idea with the chorus of “I fell for you when I saw you there, and it's only fair that you fall for me too.” The desire to be loved back is brought up again and again and intertwines all forms of media that deal with the idea of love. Klosterman too is stuck in this idea that he wants to be able to control other peoples emotions. Rob convinces Laura to love him again, why can’t normal 3-demensional people do the same?
Two point five kids and tape deck full of cheesey mix tapes has become the American Dream. Movies like High Fedelity have convinced us that if are not in a relationship based on Klosterman’s “fake love” we can not be happy. We have become a very needy society, in need of the constant reminder that we are loved and that someone cares about us, and we have decided the best way for this to be “love” to be proven is through mix-tape. We want to belive that Rob and Laura stay together forever, because we want to believe that if that really happened in real life that it would work out.