Classic Movie Review : Singles (1992)
It’s no use trying to explain the nineties to someone who hasn't lived them. Even those of us who lived through them choose not to remember them correctly. It was a bizarre time where underground culture became popular culture, but only theoretically. We talked about things like they were important even if we didn't experience them because they felt important. No one's even seen Cameron Crowe movie Singles, but it's still remembered today as this important artifact from the grunge era. So, I decided to watch it.
Singles tells the story of a bunch of friends and neighbors who are trying to figure out their love life in 1992 Seattle. There's Linda (Kyra Sedgwick) who's gotten her heart broken by a foreign exchange fuckboy (Camilo Gallardo), charming and stable Steve (Campbell Scott) who's afraid of getting hurt, carefree grunge musician Cliff (Matt Dillon), strungout, but unbreakable Janet (Bridget Fonda) and others. They stick by each other through their success and mistakes, trying to be happy and well-adjusted adults.
The Imaginary Nineties
Once again, you kind of had to be there when it happened. Before the nineties, no one self-consciously became an adult. Bills, kids and responsibilities just robbed you of your waistline, hair and youth. Because you didn’t choose a path for yourself. You just did what everyone else does: find someone, have kids with them and find a job to support them even if it wasn’t what you wanted. Cultural pressure forced you into it. In Singles, you see young adults questioning that process. No one ever did that before.
The best example of what I’m talking about is Steve and Linda who slip uneasily into a relationship they don't feel comfortable enough to define. Their romance is anything but romantic. It’s full of false starts and failures, but they’re two normal, respectful people who have found each other. So, Steve and Linda give each other chances and go back on their word in order to dig deeper and see one another’s true selves. Although their romance in insanely counterintuitive, their sincerity ends up being romantic as fuck.
Did this actually happen in the nineties? Kind of? Not really? The idea of rethinking love and relationships definitely happened and Singles in the evidence of that. These kids didn't really exist and they were a symptom of a cultural change more than cause. Now, were they an engaging and inspiring symptom? Fuck yeah, they were. They still are today. It’s easy to care about these characters. But they claim to embody something more than they embody it, like most of what happened in the nineties.
But does the memory feel right?
If you were there when it happened, Singles makes a whole lot of sense. It works as a time capsule for the grunge era like you wouldn't believe. To a point where the characters of Singles live alongside real grunge music stars like Layne Staley, Jerry Cantrell and Chris Cornell. Real people and imaginary people coexist in a fictional movie. See what I mean? What would be the equivalent of Singles in 2023 would be a feminist movie starring Taylor Swift, Beyoncé and plenty of people that don't exist.
Chuck Klosterman said it best in his book The Nineties: "There's always a disconnect between the world we seem to remember and the world that actually was. What's complicated about the 1990s is that the central illusion is the memory itself.” I thought about that during the entire runtime of Singles. It's an illusion that is hellbent on feeling real, but that doesn't even remotely want to be real. I don't think it's something that could've happened at any other time or that can be replicated.
*
So, is Singles good? According to my standards for what constitutes a good story, yes. It's unique and weird and full of soul. It's also extremely minimalistic and aesthetically dated, but that makes it even more unique and weird and soulful. It will never be something you can sell or market to a different generation of consumers, which makes its charm. But you had to be there in order to understand. Singles in bound to be eventually forgotten, but it is a time and a place. Even if it really isn’t.
