1995's greatest: empire records

before their hole-in-the-wall music store gets gobbled by the franchise monster, a group of love-starved gen-x teenagers discover who they are and what they want out of life. a fairly simple story made glorious by terrific actors, tremendous one-liners, and a soundtrack to end all soundtracks. liv tyler plays a pill-popping daddy's girl who wants to lose it to a has-been pop star, renee zellweger as the charming whore who craves confidence, and rory cochrane plays a deluded fuck-up who spends the whole movie either on a couch or holding a couch cushion for spending the money that was to "save the empire." all of this plays out as nothing short of a distinctively 90's musical with the co-workers singing and dancing their issues through popular music. i mean, who doesn't wanna play an impromptu gig on top of a building? makes me wanna make slogan buttons and dye my hair. perhaps too prophetic about the decline in record shops. "say no more, mon amour," indeed. taught me everything i needed to know about d.i.y.