Until I saw “Repo Men,” I had completely forgotten Forest Whitaker was in “Battlefield Earth.”
Not that he’s the worst thing about either movie. No, that blame in both cases has to lie with the script. But he signed on to those scripts, and frankly, he knows better. Forest Whitaker, you are actor-grounded until after actor-prom. Which I guess is the Oscars. And since they just happened, you’ve got about eleven months to think about what you’ve done.
Jude Law, I’m disappointed in you, but I’m sorry to say I’m not surprised. This is about what I’ve come to expect from you.
Liev Schrieber, you were a beacon of light in the midst of this mess, making a meal out of a morsel. Thank you for being so deliciously despicable.
The truth is that “Repo Men” is an enormously frustrating movie, amounting to a massive mismanagement of an intellectual property. I can’t write it off as just bad, because it is such a great concept. Oh, wait. Yes I can. In ridiculously appropriate fashion, I would very much like to surgically open up the movie, remove its vital organs, and transplant them into a body that makes sense, isn’t riddled with plotholes, and isn’t getting into absurd and unnecessary fist, gun, and knife fights every ten minutes because it’s so afraid its audience will get bored with it and go wander into “The Crazies.” “Repo Men,” you don’t need the popcorn theatrics; just be yourself. You are the codependent girlfriend of movies: the more desperate you are to keep us with you, the more you scare us away.
The themes and premise of this flick are intriguing and timely. There are flashes of absolute brilliance. The first five minutes set up a gritty film noir future, and the last ten showcase the most unique sex scene I’ve ever seen. Everything in between, however, made my brain roll its eyes.
The morality of the universe never makes sense for an instant. It’s very hard to swallow that even if the business of forcibly repossessing delinquent artificial organs existed, that the “repo men” entrusted with the job would do it out in the open. Or if they did, that anyone would use their product. The movie tries to wipe this inconsistency away with Frank Mercer’s (Schrieber) pitch to a potential client that “What you’ve heard about us on the news almost never happens.” But with as indiscrete as Remy (Law) and Jake (Whitaker) are, it seems likely that not only has this client heard about this on the news, but he probably witnessed one the murderous reclamations for himself on his way up the escalator (In a clever move, the offices of The Union - the sinister corporation behind all these shenanigans – are located in a suburban mall, presumably between a Hot Topic and an Orange Julius).
It’s not that I don’t think a corporation wouldn’t stoop to murder to make a buck, particularly in Movieland, I just think they would have to cover it up a bit better. As we learn from a scanner scene in an airport (remember how I said there was a ton of timely thematic material?), not only is it not covered up, but the FAA must be in on it too. The scanner is geared specifically to pick up these delinquent artificial organs. Since the FAA is a federal organization, that must mean that the government knows about all this casual civilian murder as well. I know this is the future, but I don’t think society is going to change so much that folks stop giving a crap about murder.
I’m a real “glass half-full” kind of guy.
So I didn’t buy that part of the premise. But the underlying bits, that in the world the filmmakers set up, people enter into unsustainable financial contracts in the name of obtaining the health care they need, that human beings are becoming overly reliant on technology and get suckered in to buying things they don’t need. and that corporations are after profit at the expense of everything else…that stuff I buy. The bones. The blood, the muscle, the tissues, the organs. What’s wrong with “Repo Men,” is the treatment of the potent thematic elements it’s got floating around inside. Ironically, for a movie about people replacing their failing insides, the surgery the film itself needs most is a facelift.
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