Empire Records (1995)

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

Hijinks are in heavy rotation at a lively and scuffling indy record store.

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[Edgy MD]

Coulda been a good film. But I found it to be more than a little unaware of the culture in which it was set. The young actors all seem to be over-playing their roles. I think they took advice from fools.

Thank goodness High Fidelity came along.

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

I agree it's not a good movie and that the kids all overact. There was a good amount of hotness.

It reminded me a lot of Car Wash, where there's a lot of chaos over the course of one work day. That movie also comes off as raggedy but was much better. I didn't buy into a lot of the shenanigans in this one. There's no way a retail employee steals $9000 and doesn't spend months in jail.

[Edgy MD]

I guess he was supposed to be a Ferris Buehler type who always lands on his feet or something. But agreed — a big key in retail management in the 90s was to prevent employee theft and make all the employees feel like thieves anyhow, so they would leave before they qualified for any medical benefits.

I had a friend who worked in a record store. Any record he wanted, he would drop in the garbage. He would take out the garbage at the end of his shift and walk off with a killing.

I think Car Wash was supposed to be a model for the film.

The screenwriter supposedly based it on her (I think it was a her) own experiences, but she worked at a Tower, so it kind of makes sense that they miss the indy vibe they are going for.