Spring has sprung, I suppose. Life is returning to the desloate landscape, the birds are returning to the fields, and blah blah blah...I don't give a shit about Spring.
But I do love wasting time at my local cinema.
And what lucky motion picture did I choose to help pass the time of the first lazy Sunday afternoon of Spring? Why, "Repo Men", of course!
I sure as shit wasn't going to watch Jennifer Aniston's latest attempt at comedy. I just feel for Gerard Butler. Pick your scripts more carefully, man. "Gamer 2"? Think about it.
Moving on, what exactly is "Repo Men" about? Is it just a shameless clone of that 2008 masterpiece, "Repo! The Genetic Opera", you ask?
First of all, shame on you. "Repo!" is garbage. I like the premise, I like Anthony Stewart Head, and a few of the songs are okay. But the movie itself is terrible. That girl from "Spy Kids" should never sing again. And the WTF Joan Jett cameo was just weird.
Both films do feature large corporations selling organs to the masses on credit, and if people can't make their payments, a repo man is dispatched to reclaim the corporation's property.
I don't know where "Repo!"'s GeneCo got their organs from. Were they genetically engineered? Black Market wholesale organs from impoverished African villages? They never explain it.
In "Repo Men", the organs are artificial, designed and distributed by The Union. What union? Just "The Union". It's the future, so maybe there's just one Union left.
"Repo! The Genetic Opera" is... well... more operatic, I suppose. Despite it's dystopian sci-fi trappings, the film is essentially a Greek tragedy that doesn't really give a damn about the world its characters inhabit. Nothing outside of the main plot is really explored, and I still have no idea how a powerful narcotic can be distilled from the brain of a corpse.
"Repo Men", on the other hand, at least tries to sell the world it creates. It's the future, and apparently Obama's health care reform doesn't work, because private enterprise doesn't just have a stranglehold on health care, it owns the industry lock, stock, and barrel, in the form of The Union.
These Union guys are selling artificial organs, or "artif-orgs", as they call them, to poor saps at insane prices. An artificial heart costs nearly a million bucks! In the future! Shouldn't the fact that these things are being mass produced drive the cost down just a little?
They obviously have the science behind these artif-orgs worked out, because millions of people have at least one of these things installed somewhere in their body. No mention of any adverse side-effects is made at any point in the film.
The Union is pumping artf-orgs out on an assembly line, for fuck's sake! That they still cost so goddamn much is just a giant "fuck you" to the consumer. Not to mention the mafia-esque interest rates. 20%? Jesus...
But I suppose that's the point, isn't it? You'll probably die on the waiting list for a heart transplant, so the Union is your only option. But if you're 96 days overdue on your payments, the nefarious Union will send their dreaded repo men after your negligent ass.
These Union repo guys zap you with a FUTURE TASER and cut their property right out of you.
Sure, they're obligated to ask if you want an ambulance standing by during their "operation", but usually the consumer is too busy either running or trying to kill the repo man to answer that question.
Remy (played by Jude Law) and Jake (played by Forest Whitaker) are two of the Union's best repo men. They've known each other since elementary school, when Jake used to kick Remy's ass on a regular basis. As they grew up, they became friends, joining the Union after a stint in the Army, where they had a lot of fun blowing up people in a tank.
They also really enjoy being repo men. Jake especially loves his work. In a seemingly random monologue while driving around with his best pal Remy, Jake goes on about how they're performing an important service in their repo work, enforcing the rules of their society.
You really get the feeling in this sequence that Jake really lucked out in his repo job. If the Union had not accepted his application, he'd probably be joyfully carving people up with his abundant spare time. Jake's got some issues.
Not to say that Remy is much better. Neither of these guys really give two shits about human life. Early on, Jake and Remy find a "nest" of people with defaulted artif-orgs hiding out on a cargo ship, and they hold a little competition to see who can repossess more Union property.
Kinda like the friendly competition between Gimli and Legolas in the "Lord of the Rings". But bloodier. And more sociopathic.
Afterward, Jake starts randomly babbling about some brand new Union brain implant for the comatose that can insert the patient into a paradise, where they can live for the rest of their natural lives. Now why would Jake just randomly say something like that? His little one-sided conversation comes completely out of nowhere, and feels shoehorned into the film.
Gee, I wonder if that will have any significance later on?
Carice Van Houten, who was brilliant in Paul Verhoven's "Black Book", plays Remy's wife. I believe her character's name is "One Note Bitch". She has one expression in the film: disgust.
She wants Remy to stop the repo work and become a salesman, like his friend Frank (Liev Schreiber). Not because she objects to his current job, but because a good salesman makes more money.
Remy finally relents, deciding to take one last job, because he's a big fan of the "client". So Remy goes to meet RZA, who might as well be playing himself in the film. I could see wanting to meet RZA, because he's awesome.
If I were tasked with repossessing RZA's artificial heart, I'd probably chicken out and just ask him to autograph my "Bobby Digital In Stereo" album.
Off topic, but RZA was also really good in "American Gangster". Although his Wu Tang tattoo took me right out of the movie at one point. I mean, it wasn't period-appropriate! Somebody could have airbrushed that ink off his arm for the scene. I guess anyone involved with the production recognizing the Wu Tang logo was too much to ask for.
Back to "Repo Men"! In Stereo!
Remy hangs out with RZA, tells him how much he loves the guy's work, and RZA even lets him help mix a new song in his home studio before resigning himself to a grisly death. Remy pulls out his portable defibrulator kit to stop RZA's artif-org, and ZAP! It backfires, laying Remy out.
He wakes up in the hospital, attached to a temporary blood pump. His pal Frank tells him that his heart's fucked, and he needs a new Union-certified artif-org ASAP! Remy reacts poorly to this news. Then Franks tells Remy that his bitch wife decided to leave him while he was in his coma! Remy is crestfallen.
Remy decides to leave, detaching the blood pump and trying to walk out of the hospital, blood pouring out of the gnarly holes in his chest. He doesn't get far before his ruined heart stops, and he collapses.
So the Union heart is jammed in Remy's chest, and Jake invites his best friend in the world to come live with him while he convalesces. It seems pretty obvious to me at this point that Jake is just in love with Remy.
That's why he beat the crap out of the guy in grade school. Those were love taps! He just doesn't know how to tell Remy that he wants to move to Massachusetts and get married.
Remy tries to get back on the repo job, but he finds that his heart just isn't in his work, anymore. Heh, heh. Get it? He had to lose his heart to have a heart! GET IT?! It's so fucking deep!!!
Remy can't work, anymore. Jake drags his friend out on the hunt, tasering some unfortunate soul, and tells Remy to stay as long as it takes to get his mojo back and cut out that Union artif-org! He acts like a pissed-off mother trying to force their dickhead child to eat their peas. It's hilarious.
Remy can't bring himself to commit murder, anymore. He misses his payments, and the Union wants their organ back. So Remy goes on the run. He runs into some hobo singer named Beth (played by Alice Braga, whose face haunts my dreams), and decides that he loves her.
Why? Because the plot demands it!
I personally can't see it. Her face looks like beef jerky gone wrong, and she's not a very versatile actress. She can convincingly play "ow that hurts", but that's it. Her character also has something like 10 artif-orgs, including lungs, a voice box, eyes, and ears with volume knobs and headphone jacks.
Let me repeat that: she has artificial ears with volume knobs and headphone jacks.
Wow.
And for having an enhanced voice box, her singing voice is appalling.
So Remy and Beth hide out in a dilapidated apartment building, making love by candlelight. Remy spends his days writing out his manifesto on an antique typewriter, and they live happily ever after. The End.
Until the Union repo men find them. Remy drops his trusty typewriter on one unlucky repo man's head, which splatters like a watermelon on a busy highway at 3 AM.
Jake shows up and they get into a big fight. Remy gets his ass handed to him by Jake, and nearly gets his head broken by a hook, or something... it was kinda hard to tell. But Beth zaps Jake with a FUTURE TASER, and Remy and his jerky girl get the fuck out of there.
Beth's artificial knee is busted open, and she's bleeding like crazy, so our heroes head to a local underground surgeon for a little maintenance. Beth's knee is fixed by a little 9 year-old girl who is just as cute as a button. And she proves to be a better actress in her limited screen time than Alice Braga.
Remy tells Beth that the only way to erase their debts from the system is to go to the Union HQ and access the central computer, located behind the mysterious "Pink Door".
Inside Union HQ, Remy and Beth evade security agents in a clean assembly room filled with technicians working on brand-new artif-orgs. The security guards apparently aim for the poor technicians, because none of their bullets come close to hitting our heroes. It's quite funny, actually.
They get to the Pink Door, but standing between them and their destination are six very angry sharply dressed Union employees armed with knives and hammers. Why are they armed with knives and hammers? Who the fuck cares? The whole scene is just a loving homage to the brilliant side-scrolling fight sequence in "Old Boy". There need be no logic, here.
So Remy takes off his shirt, and goes to town on these clowns with two very sharp knives and a hacksaw. It's a lot of fun, and it needed to be longer.
In order to get into the central computer, one needs to scan an artif-org at the Pink Door, so Beth scans her fake eyes. Remy and Beth enter the Pink Door just in the nick of time, as Jake and Frank are right behind them.
While Remy and Beth do whatever it is they're doing behind the Pink Door, Jake wanders around the corridor, cutting up the dead Union employees, looking for an artif-org.
Inside the central computer, Remy realizes that there is no interface, no way to write them out of the system. The only way to free themselves from this nightmare is to repossess their organs with the provided scanner.
Now this is not going to be so easy, because with the exception of Beth's eyes and ears, all of their artif-orgs are located behind a lot of pesky flesh. Thus begins perhaps my favorite part of the film.
Remy pulls out his knife and cuts a big hole in his abdomen, and Beth shoves the scanner up into his chest cavity to scan his artificial heart. Job done, he seals up the gaping, bloody wound with a handy-dandy medical sealant.
Remy got off easy. Beth has a lot of Union equipment jammed in her torso, and it's gonna take some time to scan all of her artf-orgs. He gets her high with some red cocaine, and gets to cutting.
What commences, with the cutting, and the blood, and the shoving of a scanner into brand new gory holes (looks a lot like "glory holes". hmmm...), is essentially a love scene. It's all played in a very romantic way, with Remy kissing Beth's neck and ears, coupled with the camera angles and musical choices.
It's like David Cronenberg walked on set the day this scene was filmed and just started directing. Very, very weird, and almost hypnotic.
As Remy finishes raping his girlfriend's torso with a scanner, Jake and Frank walk in. It's like Jeffrey Dahmer being caught masturbating by his mom.
Frank tells Jake to cut them both up and take back all of their Union parts, but Jake has a change of heart and stabs Frank in the brain via his jaw with a knife. Hooray! But the trio can't exit through the Pink Door until the reclaimed artif-orgs have been placed in the nearby receptacle. Quite a pickle.
No worries, though. Jake pulls out a few grenades and shoves them in the receptacle, blowing up the central Union database and wiping out the debts of millions of people! Happy ending!
But we're not through, yet. We rejoin our heroes on a picturesque, sandy beach. They're all drinking cute little mixed drinks with umbrellas in them. Jake and Remy are talking about his recently published manifesto, called "The Repossession Mambo". That's a not-so-clever inside joke.
It's not all perfect, though, because Beth and her odd face are also there. But it's a happy enough ending, I suppose.
Too bad it's all in his head!!!!!
Yes, apparently Jake did manage to brain his friend Remy with that hook, because he's laid out on a stretcher with a bunch of metal thingies jammed in his ruined skull. Remy's just been implanted with that brand new brain enhancement Jake mentioned seemingly for no reason near the beginning of the film.
It seems that Jake still cares for his friend, and demanded that the Union give Remy the brain implant. He's also apparently paying for the implant himself, which makes him a really good friend. Jake just wants his friend to be happy, one way or another.
So we end with Remy on his digital beach, with his digital friends and their digital drinks, having a digital good time.
This ending is a direct homage to "Brazil", and director Miguel Sapochnik has even admitted this. The original scripted ending was essentially just the beach wrap-up, without the twist, and Sapochnik didn't think that was good enough.
So instead, we're treated to the ending that many people swear is the real, between-the-lines ending to Steven Spielberg's "Minority Report".
Does it work? I guess that depends on the individual. If you have half a brain, you can see it coming a mile away, as soon as Jake starts rambling about the brain implant ten minutes into the film.
I was hoping that I was wrong about the ending throughout the movie, then my head began to ache when I realized that I was sadly right.
Would the original ending have been better? Not really, because then it's all wrapped up with a nice, shiny bow. The "dream" ending works very well in "Brazil", but here it bothers me a little. It just feels like a lesser movie cribbing from a greater movie.
I did like the implication that Jake still wanted to help his friend, despite his loyalty to the Union.
Mostly, the twist ending just illustrates that Remy's mind is really fucked up, considering the things he does in LaLa Land.
Is "Repo Men" a good movie? Overall, yes. The chemistry between Jude Law and Forest Whitaker is believable. They really do seem like old friends. Although the fact that Forest Whitaker is 11 years older than Jude Law makes it a little hard to believe that these two characters went to school together.
Liev Schrieber is good as Frank. He seems to be having a good time playing the ultra-smarmy variation of a used car salesman.
Sadly, Carice Van Houten and Alice Braga are awful in the film. There is absolutely no chemistry between Jude Law and either of his love interests. But a lot of those problems are with the screenwriters, who have no idea how to right a believable female character.
The gore effects are top-notch. The action sequences are, for the most part, highly entertaining. The film has a very good, very dark sense of humor. And I was able to buy the dystopian, corporate world the film created.
And fucking RZA is in this movie.
I just wish a better writer had come along to work on that ending.
Miguel Sapochnik did a decent job with his first film. He's got some talent, and I hope his next film, an adaptation of "The Contortionist's Handbook", showcases his talent a little better.
Just don't cast Alice Braga. She is the antithesis of good.
"Repo Men" > "Repo! The Genetic Opera"
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