Review of film: “REPO MEN”

2010, 03-16:

Review of film:  “REPO MEN”

           

Director:

Miguel Sapochnik

Writers:

Eric Garcia   

Garrett Lerner

Starring:

Jude Law

Forest Whitaker

Alice Braga

Liev Schreiber

Carice van Houten

Chandler Canterbury

Joe Pingue

Liza Lapira

Tiffany Espensen

Yvette Nicole Brown

RZA

Wayne Ward

Tanya Clarke           

Max Turnbull           

MPAA Rating:

R for for strong bloody violence, grisly images, language and some sexuality/nudity.

Quotes:

“[Tagline:] For a price, any organ in your body can be replaced. But it can also be repossessed..”

“If either one was possible, then BOTH of them had to be possible, too!”

“They do the same ‘horizontal mambo’…”

“A job’s a job, right?!”

“What’s NEW in you?”

“It’s rules…”

“I’m not cut-out for Sales.”

“You’ve done this a thousand times!”

“Making people [die] becomes second nature.”

“Give it to somebody else…”

“Take me OUT of the system…”

“Now, he’s yours.”

“Welcome to your world, Repo Man.”

“There is NO way out.”

“Is she really WORTH it?”

“End it, Jake— now!”

“He PAID to have it published…”

MY Rating:

7.5 of 10 stars (based on an advance screening of the 111-minute film).

        “Customer Service” DOESN’T APPLY here, Folks!…

No, this is NOT a remake of the 1984 Emilio Estevez film “REPO MAN” about guys who repossess people’s cars...

...  It’s instead a film based on Eric Garcia’s novel "The Repossession Mambo", set in a FUTURE time period & place where people can use credit to buy artificial organs to keep them alive… 

…  The “catch” is, the company selling them -- “The Union” -- purposely doesn’t point out how they’re extremely expensive & can be can be REPOSESSED if someone is LATE on making their regular payments… 

…  Furthermore, the absent governmental “authorities” have seemingly given them & their agents (the Repo men) license for the VIOLENT efforts constantly made to retrieve the property involved, “no questions asked”…

…  Frank (LIEV SCHREIBER) is the deceptive, uncaring head of “The Union”.  He wants RESULTS (in the form of getting control of the valuable replacement organs), & urges his Repo Men to spare no effort to quickly get back the devices with “overdue” payments owed on them…

…  His main Repo guys are Remy (JUDE LAW) & Jude’s childhood buddy Jake (FOREST WHITAKER), who often rough-house with each other.  They carry hand devices which can “SCAN” people to determine if they have any organs that are “behind” in payments, + loads of guns, knives, & other weapons to brutally ATTACK those in “arrears” & forcibly REMOVE the expensive artificial organs (which will make the Repo guys & the company even more money…

…  Jude’s wife Carol (CARICE VAN HOUTEN) is FED-UP with the malicious life he leads, & keeps urging him to leave his job.  When he fights that idea, she works to keep his beloved young son Peter (CHANDLER CANTERBURY) away from him, which causes a lot of tension between the married couple…    

…  Jude likes the MONEY he gets for being a Repo Man, & that attitude is strongly encouraged by Forest who’s even MORE dedicated at being a “Union” man (in the way he seems to love attacking usually-defenseless distressed people)…

…  During one of his usually-bloody organ-removals, Jude chances to get badly shocked by some electrical equipment, & he HIMSELF needs to have a new Jarvik artificial heart installed in his own body.  That means, he also has become subject to the REPO of what’s keeping him alive…  That becomes the “final straw” for his wife, who leaves him…

…  Having to live with the replacement organ makes Jude realize what such people “GO” thru in life, & that makes him suddenly UNEAGER to do more forcible retrievals of such devices from other people… 

…  Forest points out how that’s bad for his income, & eventually urges Jude to try SELLING the Artiforg devices instead…  That doesn’t go well, since Jude dislikes DECEIVING the potential buyers, & that attitude makes people shy-away from committing to buy the expensive organs that they can easily lose back to the company…

…  In time, Jude realizes he needs to go on the “RUN”, since “The Union” is trying to take BACK his own synthetic heart…  In doing that, he meets a woman named Beth (ALICE BRAGA) whom he’d known long ago, & who has since gotten LOTS of artificial parts and organs...

...  That situation puts her at even greater risk of being forced to return them (DEAD or alive, with the former being the “easier” way in the eyes of “The Union” repo-ers)…

…  When Jude falls far behind in his payments & also tries to help Alice with her problems, Liev sends various “Union” people AFTER them to recover the company’s ill-gotten devices (from those who’d gotten ill), & that causes more & more violent confrontations (such as with Union man T-Bone, played by RZA)…

…  Will Jude find a way to “CANCEL” the fact that he & Alice owe lots of money to “The Union”?…  Will the Repo people succeed in TRACKING DOWN those two people who are so “overdue” & delinquent in both their accounts & their “actions”?!…  Will FOREST turn against Jude?…

…  Will people RESIST what the Union has been so freely doing over the years?…  What will HAPPEN to Jude, Alice, Forest & much-hated Liev by the time the story concludes?...

…  In certain ways, there’s a fascinating “BLADE-RUNNER” type atmosphere to the world Jude & the others often live in…  The characterizations are well-done, with periodic “over-the-top” methods to the “everyday” roles, but with some good & unanticipated surprise “TWISTS” at the end… 

…  While I found the basic ideas very INTRIGUING, I found the movie’s malignant bloody savagery too often overly OFF-PUTTING, which is why I rated the film as I did…

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