Film: High Fidelity (2000)
Directed by: Steven Frears
Written by: a bunch of guys—Steve Pink, John Cusack, Scott Rosenberg (based on the novel by Nick Hornby)
Starring: Joan Cusack, and a brother she has, Lisa Bonet, Todd Louiso, Iben Hjejle
Primavera People,
It is spring and the Ms. Wonderful Film Club is presenting a series of posts and podcasts called Joan-Land, to celebrate Joan Cusack.
She’s the sister with flair and spark that keeps showing up for her brother, John—and also! also!—has her own charm and charisma.
I hope you will join us on this little jaunt through Joan-Land over the next month or so, where we watch films with Joan Cusack (also starring John, her brother, whatever, maybe you’ve heard of him).
It is a season of Joan-Liness. Joan is the name of my grandmother, first of all. And it’s the name of my friend Jenn’s grandmother, too.
Then you have Joan of Arc, who made quite a splash in the tail end of the Middle Ages. Can we suggest she brought on the Renaissance and made France great? Sure. Let’s suggest it. Joans are special.
You cannot confuse a Joan with a Joni/Joanie, by the way. Those are two different cans of beans.
This is how I would describe the place that Joan Cusack holds in the films where she plays bit parts alongside her brother.
If you ordered a fish dish at a great New Orleans restaurant, and the main dish was blackened catfish—or even just well-seasoned catfish—you’d need an excellent side dish to accompany the catfish, because no one wants catfish alone on a plate, no matter how quality the catfish is.
What Joan Cusack is, is the maple honey glazed, mashed sweet potatoes on the side of the catfish, that makes the dish jaw-droppingly good.
Maple-honey pureed sweet potatoes. Just take that in.
Joan.
Joan Cusack appears in 10 movies with her brother, and we’re going to watch a couple of them (Grosse Pointe Blank, Say Anything) as well as a couple where Joan gets to dance on her own in the holly-sphere (Friends with Money, Unicorn Store).
Let’s just start the conversation with High Fidelity (2000) where Joan plays Liz, a friend to Rob (John Cusack) and Laura (Iben Hjejle), the main couple of the film.
Liz not only listens and comforts both people, but she tells Rob directly what a jerk he is, and Robs need loud people to tell them the jerks they are being, when they act like snide, disgruntled adolescents instead of grown men.
Rob is such a man-child in this movie. I loved the book High Fidelity by Nick Hornby when it came out, and I even made a mix tape for my boyfriend with a quote from the novel High Fidelity. I never felt the movie really captured the pizazz the book did, though, because in the movie, John Cusack talks to the camera. And don’t get me wrong—he’s adorable, and he’s John Cusack, so I forgive him ceaselessly—but it makes more sense to me that the character Rob would be this immature and egotistical in his head, and not out loud. The guy thinks the world revolves around him and can only focus on his own feelings of rejection, and women are just these statues he watches, like life is a museum and he’s constantly wandering around in awe at the beauty and miraculousness and historical-ness of it all. And he can only value a woman once she’s gone in his life, which is more man-childishness. I don’t mind all those thoughts and fears about rejection and romance happening in someone’s mind, on the written page, because we all have racing thoughts and obsessions from time to time. I just don’t want to see a Rob so obviously adolescent on screen—and I prefer John Cusack in suits, in movies. Black suits. Or long. light grey trench coats with high-top sneakers. These are the outfits on John Cusack of which I approve. Not slightly open, loose-fitting, button-down shirts. Those clothes just suggest a man who isn’t trustworthy—and I like my John Cusacks trustworthy.
Besides, Rob hangs out with this guy Barry (played by Jack Black) and I just can’t respect Rob if he hangs out with Barry because you know a person by who their friends are, and Barry is not good news. His obsession with music and vinyl records only discreetly hides his psychopathic tendencies, and you don’t need someone like that working in your store—I don’t care how stubbornly persistent they are about their musical genius.
But Dick (played by Todd Louiso)—him, I can handle. He’s okay.
Still, grow up, Rob.
The point is, that Joan Cusack holds a very important space in this cinematic universe even if the space is relatively small. And we need to pay attention to those who play relatively small parts but pack the bang that gets the movie out of the old, worn stacks under a shelf somewhere, and makes it heard. This is what Joan Cusack consistently does in films with her brother—and beyond.
For instance, try listening to the band The Head & the Heart without Charity Rose and just see if The Head & the Heart would be anywhere right now. When I saw that band in concert, people did the normal concert jawn of clapping and dancing to the tunes, but when Charity Rose started singing in her small parts of certain songs, people went wild. They were overcome with the Roseliness of everything grand.
Therefore, Joan Cusack is the Charity Rose to John Cusack movies, and even more because…
She’s a Joan.
And we all know the way that women’s names signify a certain kind of personality.
The Karens. The Bettys.
When you are called “a Joan”?
Oh wow.
Oh. Wow.
You know what I mean.
So get your watchlist ready. First up, Ms. Cool and Ms. Wonderful will be talking about Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) on the podcast for next week. So watch it! (You can buy this movie currently for $4.99 on Amazon Prime and I am not advertising for Amazon Prime but this is a good deal.)
Heartily Yours,
Ms. Wonderful
Your Sunday Vinyl…because because
(Isn’t this a holiday about resurrection? Let it be so.)
I also made a Spotify playlist for High Fidelity because I felt extra generous this a.m. and just to show you, Rob, what I can do better than you can do, half-asleep….
Spotify playlist here.