We Asked a Bunch of Kids Born in the '90s to Review Some Classic Generation-X Films

I'm not a movie buff, but this past week I pretended that I was. I gathered a bunch of friends to watch a few of Generation X's favorite coming-of-age movies so that we could learn from/openly mock some of our forbearers' cultural touchstones. My (super-old!) editors suggested I to check out Empire Records, Trainspotting, Reality Bites, Slacker, and Singles—generation-defining films that most of us had never seen (or heard of). I mean, we were born between 1993-1997, so we also weren't alive when most of the movies were released, but that didn't stop of us from voicing our opinion on the glorious 90s.

The entire movie takes place over one awesome day in a record store. The cops are called about four times, there's a love story, a suicide story, and a takedown of a speed freak. There's also an almost-sex scene, followed by an actual sex scene of two girls trying to live out their fantasy with their pop-star crush. This movie literally had it all and we loved it.

The stereotypical '90s traits made us laugh even if it was unintentional. My pal Keith says it really can't be a '90s movie until you've lost count of how many times the hot guy has pushed his hair back and looks up with a smile. That luscious, voluminous Rachel-Green-Lizzie-McGuire hair was something to aspire to.

The movie kicks off with one of the kids losing $9,000 of the store's money while gambling, in an attempt to save Empire Records from being sold. Here, you are also introduced to a version of the '90s fuccboi, the worst fuccboi of all: black hair in a bowl cut matched with a black turtleneck and combats boots all tied together with a "damn the man" attitude. You've then got your preppy girl who secretly does drugs and is dying to lose her virginity. We also have a punk mistress who shaves her head in a scene that's eerily similar to Britney Spears' future breakdown. You start to love the characters' quirks and misfit personalities.

The only thing they have in common is that they love working at the store—they're the rock stars of the neighborhood. And as all good teen movies go, they hardly ever actually worked.

"For me, the only really relatable character was Joe Reeves, the owner of Empire Records, who is legitimately pissed that one of his employees decided to gamble away all the store's money in some half-assed attempt at saving them from the clutches of the man," says my buddy Jake. "I've never had that much fun at a job in high school, so fuck those kids."

The best comparison that I could make to this job today is working in HMV, but half the shit they sell isn't even music anymore. We never got booths to listen to music and make out in. This is an outrage.

"I think it's still considered cool to work at a record store in present day, but that sure as shit isn't the case when they're filled with CDs," said Alex. "It still boggles my mind cassettes are making a comeback. Tapes are like fanny packs and visors. Leave them in the '90s."

Rating: 9/10

How many beers to make the rating perfect: 2

While this film had what some, like my friend Alex, might call a "charming bleakness," others might consider this to be a mind-numbingly depressing flick. Whatever you feel, this addiction-riddled sequence of events hits home to some part of all of us. The characters constantly try to run away from responsibility and escape the system, no matter how many times they fail.

The seemingly plotless film follows a group of friends who turn out not to be very good friends at all. The crew lives through an organized insanity by shooting-up around every corner of pain, anger, or sadness. Addictions are more like enslavement. Personally I hate needles, and they don't make heroin look very appealing anyway.

Despite the (alleged) fact that drugs are bad, the drugs definitely create a bond between them that only they understand. To outsiders, they might only look like, well, a bunch of fucked up junkies.

"The half-baked, drug-infused tale of almost-friendship did more to reinforce my mom's 'don't do drugs' advice than emulate a care-free and wacky '90s lifestyle (or lack thereof) movie," says my friend Keith (he's practically straight edge).

Still, there is something to be said about lads becoming closer when they make bad decisions together. Do you think that the ravers, after-hour clubgoers, and drug takers of today care if they're getting in shit sometimes? Nah, they have each other, they have a good time, and they deal with the consequences later. The system is still fucked, and you still can't survive outside of it.

Rating: 8/10

How many beers to make the rating perfect: 4 (Of course, Keith says that alcohol is stupid).

This was pretty alright, too. The movie stars a young Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke, and Ben Stiller. Ben Stiller also directed it, which was cool, because we didn't know he directed. (Editor's Note: He directed Zoolander and it was perfect.)

Reality Bites taps into the lives of a bunch of friends freshly graduated from college. We focus on Lelaina Pierce's (Winona Ryder) introduction to the miserable world of adulthood: poverty, loneliness, and Big Gulps.

Life after graduating is still scary, and possibly worse now. We could tell this was a Gen-X movie when Lelaina went to print journalism for work, thinking it was a good career choice.

Lelaina's best friend, Vickie, is a manager at the Gap (whoa '90s) and offers her a job that Lelaina, for some reason, turns down.

"I don't think it's dumb working at the Gap, she needed the money," says Leila, a friend of mine who works part-time at the Gap. "I don't see what's wrong with retail or minimum wage job at this age, she was expecting too much out of her life. She should suck it up, because REALITY BITES."

I bet Gen X thought they had it hard. Lelaina is working at a television studio, and not as an unpaid intern. She's not doing so badly by our standards. Stop your bitching, Lelaina.

"If there's anything us millennials don't need, it's a reboot of the 'upper-middle class besties in the big world' genre," says Alex.

Alex also says this movie upset him because Ben Stiller is portrayed as a bad-guy yuppie. Sorry Alex.

We enjoyed this gang of degenerates but felt the characters' archetypes were a little over the top, which was probably on purpose. I hope. We get that Troy is supposed to be the cool, chill, stoner guy. That doesn't mean we have to question if he ate shrooms for breakfast.

Rating: 6/10

How many beers to make the rating perfect: 7 (and whatever Troy is on).

This movie was literally about nothing, and I don't think I can emphasize that enough. It's a collection of vignettes—the camera clings to whoever walks by it. You're thrown into the world of this campus town in Texas, and the average life for these young adults. Texas in the late '80s looks kind of terrible, sort of like this movie.

"Apparently two types of people lived in 1990's Austin, Texas: bored, unemployed eccentrics and the poor blokes barely listening to them," notes Alex.

While there's no plot or storyline whatsoever, you get the essence of the era and the different groups there were. You've got your weirdos, hippies, punks, conspiracy theorists, techies and so on. It was difficult to keep up when switching between characters so frequently. I also felt like I had to be on drugs to get it.

"As much as it was a movie about nothing it made a lot of insightful points," says Kasey. "It's very relatable in a way, I feel like a lot of the young adults look like slackers but they also don't know what they want in life."

In fact, Kasey made a list of preparations for this movie.

1) Get high.

2) Get ready for a movie about nothing.

3) Just try to enjoy it best you can, go in with an open/high mind.

Don't be fooled by the "comedy" label either, there are a lot of monologues, to the point where they start to go over your head. Or maybe I'm just too sober for this.

The highlights of the whole 97 minutes are maybe the vignettes of a girl who was trying to sell Madonna's pap smear to her friends, or of a man obsessed with comparing life to the TV. The best way to describe this is feeling like it was an over-budgeted student film. You could say they slacked a little on this movie!!! (Not sorry)

Rating: 6/10

How many beers to make the rating perfect: 0 (this is more of a call for pharmaceutical grade weed).

Singles is about a group of neighbors and friends who live in a Seattle apartment comprised of mainly single rooms (get it?). The movie dives into the perils of dating, dating after that date flops, and finding someone who suits you. It even managed to get a couple laughs out of us. Except for Keith, who thought it was stupid. Sorry Keith, your expectations are too high for this generation. We've been blessed with effects and acting of the 21st century.

The whole movie is split into different chapters, under different titles. We felt it was more like a seven-season sitcom merged into one romantic comedy with a speedy story and lackluster plot.

"They were funny sometimes but tried to cover a bit too much ground, so you got 10 minute stretches that covered a budding relationship, proposal, pregnancy AND miscarriage after a car accident," says Sean. "Slow down Singles, slow down."

We are introduced to two couples. An awkward girl who wants to be an architect and a drummer in a band (played by Bridget Fonda and Matt Dillon, respectively) who seem completely wrong for each other. Why do girls always fall for the purposeless bad boy artist? Then there's a heart-broken environmentalist and an equally heart-broken city builder (Kyra Sedgwick and Campbell Scott) who seem to be perfect for each other.

"Overall—not that great. Too jumbled a concept and the acting and writing wasn't good enough to carry a movie about nothing. This wasn't Seinfeld," says Sean.

A point of annoyance for us was that they all look a lot older than the age of their characters. Alex felt like bad boy artist, Matt Dillon, resembles a "guy who was a mumbling grunge musician who's 10 years too old to be 'making a break big anytime soon now, trust me.'"

"Dude would probably buy likes on Facebook in present day. Ew." Alex, like Keith, your expectations are too high.

Did you also know that making videos was a way of meeting people to date? Like people made a VHS tape of themselves doing something like a magic trick, and watched videos that other people made. I guess it's like tinder, but requires more effort. Dammit '90s.

Rating: 5/10

How many beers to make the rating perfect: 10. That's right, Ten.

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