There’s never been an easier time for disaffected people to make their voices heard. Social media and podcasts provide outlets for anyone to amass large followings spouting vagaries against the system, irrespective of the merit of any of their arguments. As we’ve seen with the right-wing echo chamber known as the “manosphere,” having a large platform does not instill a sense of responsibility to be careful with such power and influence.

The 1990 film Pump Up the Volume often plays like a stereotypical Gen X high school film, rife with angst towards the previous generations that stifle their individuality. Mark Hunter (Christian Slater) is a high school student who recently moved to a suburb of Phoenix, Arizona for his father’s job. Mark is a socially awkward loner with little social contact throughout the day. At night, he broadcasts a pirate FM radio show under the pseudonym “Hard Harry,” playing music and raging against the machine that is his local high school.

Mark’s show attracts little notice at first, rising in popularity as students at his school sell bootlegs of his show. The faculty starts to take an interest after a student commits suicide shortly after appearing on Mark’s show. Another student, Nora De Niro (Samantha Mathis), discovers Mark’s identity, urging him to use his voice to lead his fellow students in protesting the school, whose principal, Lorretta Creswood (Annie Ross), is doing her best to manipulate test scores to secure additional funding.

Slater showcases a remarkable range as Mark, who often plays like a clueless rebel without a cause. Much of Hard Harry’s musings are generic fluff without much substance, carrying the same level of intellectualism as high school freshmen getting stoned in their parents’ basement for the first time. The film doesn’t put much weight behind the school’s “problems” until late in the third act, a half-baked premise that frequently undercuts its own message.

What sets Mark apart from the shock jocks he tries to emulate is the sin for which he’d be cast out from the manosphere if the film were made today. Mark cares about the ramifications of his words. Mark’s show radicalizes his fellow students to take action against the school. While people like Nora encourage him to keep going, Mark pauses to consider the implications of his power.

Mark is also quite different from many leading bad boys of his time. Mark lacks the effortless cool factor that defined the likes of John Bender and Ferris Bueller, only coming out of his shell behind the comforts of anonymity provided by his show, where he uses a harmonizer to mask his voice. It takes Nora embodying peak manic pixie dream girl to break through his anti-social security blanket, Mathis commanding every scene she’s in, often through mere facial expressions.

Writer/director Allan Moyle’s work takes itself too seriously at times, consistently bailed out by Slater’s mesmerizing performance and an exceptional soundtrack anchored by Leonard Cohen. The chemistry between Slater and Mathis is the most interesting dynamic in the film, but Moyle rarely gives them the runway. The character work constantly plays second fiddle to the atmosphere, much to the film’s detriment.

Social media often makes a person feel like they’re screaming into the void, irrespective of follower count. Engagement-driven algorithms seek to teach us that nothing is worth saying unless somebody is listening. You’re meant to believe that if you don’t get likes, you are not liked.

Despite a lackluster screenplay, Pump Up The Volume stands out from its contemporaries through its earnest sincerity. Disaffected youth don’t want to hear that it gets better. Slater found a way to reach them anyway. The film is hardly Gen X’s greatest cinematic triumph, but one that remains particularly relevant in today’s uncertain times.