Rating: 
Summary: My Ride's Here (The Repo Man Cometh)
Review: We all have that twiggy nesting-material of books, music, and film media we like to snuggle into, works of art that built our world, that tug at our heart-cockles, that giddy us up like laughing gas in an orgone-chamber, that string us out in a smirking nostalgia-trip that can't be bought, and yet (here's the craw-sticker), when trying to submit our passions for peer-review, are frankly at a loss as to *why* these idiocentric kinks and foibles gave us such a buzz in the first place.Take Alex Cox's *Repo Man*(1984), for instance. Why on earth is this ridiculous little sci-fi cartoon so important to me? Originally slated as a UCLA student film (and it shows), the film's dramatic logic is more disjointed than a book of Zen koans penned by Chuck Palahniuk. Its characters (to call them that) are flimsier than paper-mache finger-puppets framed with matchsticks and epoxy, onscreen relationships as stodgy, rushed, and unconvincing as Brazilian soap opera sans attractive actors. The dialogue is hammy, inconsistent, rife with hairy non sequiturs, and not always as funny as it thinks it is (just think Troma Studios cross-bred with the endless performative one-liners of *Reservoir Dogs*). Sure, postmodern rigamarole can be fun, and *Repo Man* is intended as devil-may-care black farce, but how on earth did the folks at Universal end up green-lighting this punk-infused bit of cine-trash? (As Mike Nesmith reveals in the commentary, it was a "negative pick-up," funded by the producer and then pimped out to the studios as easy product.) And yet, and *yet*, the film has a certain.....texture. A panicky edge, a plaintive unreality, grainy and punked-up, infusing South Central and East L.A. location-shooting with Cox's eerie, hard-boiled vision of suburban grunge and quasi-criminal subcultures. The scene where the lights go out over the railway bridge, or when the repo men congregate behind the rusted chain-link of the midnight oil refinery, basked in the cosmic blues of the arc-lamps, the neon reds, greens, and purples of storefronts seeping in at the margins, an urban netherworld harkening back to the salad days of ye olde Interzone (in the hospital scene, the P.A. system hails "Dr. Benway to surgery."), it all greases the rails for the viewer to lose himself in Cox's hoarse and loopy dream. In the vapid, Reagan-era '80s, *Repo Man* offered something heady, dangerous, intoxicating. A mosh-pit alternative to mainstream kitsch like *Caddyshack* or *Fletch*. (Although *Repo Man* is itself a sort of knowing meta-kitsch.) In its reckless, quirky collusion of disconnected set-pieces and sucker-punch transitions, its visual ad-libbing and unrepentant *silliness*, Cox produces a nerve-janglin' day-trippin' kick-back film (the DVD should have come with a complimentary six-pack) cobbled out of spare parts and spinning wildly into mutant tangents. (*Repo Man* still has the capacity to excite young filmmakers with its shoestring bravado. This is flea-market filmmaking at its most raucous.) I think what holds the flick together in the end is the offbeat charisma of the actors hamming it up to Cox's decidedly non-linear script. Acting legend Harry Dean Stanton is slumming as "Bud," the hardened, grizzly vet of the repo biz, hopped up on coke and speed, Oedipalizing over his protege Otto (Emilio Estevez), the punky Repo Boy. In the film's sweaty mesh of MacGuffin-seeking narrative zig-zags, a tenderness develops between the two actors, the plucky old codger initiating his Dickensian orphan-liege into a para-criminal lifestyle -- but Cox's pomo squiggling ultimately breaks down any sort of character-development. (Otto visiting Bud in the hospital, after leaving him for dead in a puddle of broken glass and Heinz ketchup (literally), is both tender, bemusing, truncated, and completely out of left field.) Some of the best lines came from special monologues Cox scripted to audition actors, but never intended for the final cut. The actors themselves loved the monologues so much that they pushed to have them included. "S'pose your thinking 'bout a plate of shrimp. Suddenly somebody says 'plate,' or 'shrimp,' or 'plate of shrimp,' just outta the blue...it's all part of the universal subconscious.... Flying saucers are really time machines." And so on. *Repo Man* was intended as a parable of nuclear war, the original script ending with the atomic destruction of Los Angeles ("Starting with the Valley and then moving out from there," says Cox on the commentary track), but what remains is too heterodox to be "about" anything. (All's I know is that it rocks.) The DVD commentary (including Cox himself, producer Michael Nesmith (yes, the guy from the Monkees), Del Zamora (the Rodriguez brother with the hair-net), Sy Richardson (the black repo man: "You're still on the job, white boy! Get in the car!"), and Zander Schloss (as Kevin the Nerd, and later vocalist for the Circle Jerks)) makes you feel like you're sharing a kegger with a gaggle of old cronies, laughing when they laugh, feeding off their enthusiasm and nostalgia, ninety minutes of overheard conversation from the next booth -- a panacea for the lonely. Disappointingly, the DVD offers no deleted scenes, many of which appeared in the edited-for-television version of the film (the one where Otto's potty-mouthed invectives comes out as "Flip you, Melon Farmer! Flip your mother!"). When *Repo Man* was initially cut for TV, the censors removed so much objectionable material that the running time got skimmed down to 55 minutes! To pad the film, Cox reintroduced scenes that didn't make it into the theatrical version, like Harry Dean Stanton demolishing a bank of pay-phones with a sledgehammer, or Otto returning home to find his parents still hunkered down in the TV-room, covered in cobwebs, giving their life-savings to the evil arch-televangelist Rev. Larry "to send bibles to El Salvador."(...!) But no matter. Repo man's got all night, every night. Now let's go get sushi and not pay.
Rating: 
Summary: The test of time.
Review: There are some movies one sees as an adolescent that simly don't hold up upon reviewing later; Repo Man is not one of them. Whether you're a young punk rocker, a die hard sci-fi fan or simply an aging fart, Repo Man remains a joy to watch.
Rating:
Summary: 18 years later, still my favorite movie
Review: Repo Man is completely unclassifiable. Funny, dark, biting, thrilling, confusing, action, adventure, it's all there. Emilio Estevez plays Otto, a "white suburban punk" living in LA's sprawl, with a nowhere job that he loses in the film's second scene. When his hippie parents admit they sent his college fund to a TV preacher (We're sending Bibles to El Salvador!), Otto meets Bud (Harry Dean Stanton), a cocaine-driven Repo Man who needs an extra driver. Otto joins the firm and soon learns the Repo Code; Bud's version (You see, a Repo Man gets himself INTO tense situations), and the other regulars at Helping Hand Auto share their philosophies too. Light finds Bud's view tedious but is willing to handle shoot-outs when he's not reading parodies of Scientology (Diuretix), Miller seems completely neuron-fried (The more you drive, the less intelligent you are), and Oly is along to make a four-pack. (Did you notice the four experienced Repo Men are named after beers?) Let's go get a drink, kid! Multiple plot strands at first seem unrelated, but bind together closer and tighter as the film moves along. Otto and the other Repo Men are on the lookout for a 1964 Chevy Malibu, with a $25,000 bounty. So are some creepy FBI agents, who stalk and kidnap Otto. And so are Helping Hand's arch-rivals, who careen into the plot whenever things are getting dull. The car's driven by a nuclear physicist in from Los Alamos, who warned a CHP officer not to look in the trunk (with deadly results). Otto's punk friends find the car while breaking into a pharmaceutical factory, but they're too stupid to keep it. (These three are some of the dumbest criminals ever shown in film, including Kevin Kline's Otto in _A Fish Called Wanda_) Otto finds love, after a fashion, but since this is Reaganesque LA, even his girlfriend has her own motives. ("Otto! What about our relationship?" Otto's reply is a brilliant retort to Cary Grant's last line in Gone with the Wind.) The film abounds with hilarious throw-away lines, signs, and labels. Several scenes take place in food stores, and all the food is generically labeled. Multiple viewings are required to catch them all; be sure to read all the signs in the windows. Even the TV preacher shows up on several television sets. Repo Man takes its structure from Miller's bizarre rant about the cosmic latticework of interconnectedness, because everything is interconnected, and Miller turns out to be right about all of it by the end. "And flying saucers are... You got it. Time Machines." Top it off with a TERRIFIC sound track by Iggy Pop, Black Flag, The Circle Jerks, and a host of others from the punk scene and this is one of the best movies ever made.
Rating:
Summary: A classic, but where are the extra scenes
Review: "Repo Man" is a classic film and I've enjoyed it for years. But I can't believe that the DVD version doesn't have all the extra scenes that were added for the TV version. That was a real missed opportunity.
Rating:
Summary: All I can say is "Zuh?"
Review: No, really. That's all I can say. Well, I can say that this is either brilliant of simply too bizarre, or both. All I know is that it is hilarious. Otto's answer to the final question is priceless.
Rating:
Summary: Punk Rock Lives On
Review: Repo Man is one the greatest cult movies of all time and also has one of the best movie soundtracks ever created. This film is not for anyone who does not have a slightly bizarre taste in movies. However, if you are a fan of cult movies or punk rock than this movie is for you.
The story has to do with a young "white suburban punk" named Otto(Estevez) who loses his job and pretty much everything else. He gets hired to help a repo man with a repossession and is stuck for life. The plot gets more complicated when a lobotimized scientist shows up with something in his trunk that everybody seems to want for reasons unknown.
Some of the highlights are the Circle Jerks cameo as a lounge band ("I can't believe I used to like these guys"), Otto's really stupid punk friends ("Come on let's go commit crimes" "Yeah, let's get sushi and not pay"), and the theory of cosmic unconsciousness.
Punk rock and B-movies are two of the greatest things to ever come out of America ever and this movie captures them perfectly. This is one cult movie that truly deserves it's following.
The soundtrack is as much a classic as the actual film and is a vital collection of LA punk (Black Flag, Suicidal Tendencies, The Circle Jerks etc.) Iggy Pop even performs the great theme.
"The life of a repo man is always intense."
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic and weird film
Review: This is one of my all time favorite films. However you must have a somewhat warped sense of humor to enjoy it. If you grew up around the 80's punk scene you will enjoy the soundtrack (Black Flag, Fear, Circle Jerks). The Circle Jerks even have a cameo as a lounge act. Estevez plays his character great but Harry Dean Stanton is perfect as the veteran repo man. The plot is simple: the government has placed a large bounty on a Chevy Malibu containing the bodies of aliens in the trunk. Who will find the car first? The film is full of recurring themes and images. You will need to watch it multiple times to catch them all. There are many, many quotable lines as well. A great movie if you like weird or "cult" movies. Stay away if you just like the blockbusters.
Rating:
Summary: Repo Planktin
Review: I don't think this film deserves 4 stars, but Amazon doesn't let you do 3 1/2, so, yeah. I remember seeing the box for this movie forever when I was a kid going to my local video store. Emilio Estevez looking intense, the blown out title, pop artist design of the box. It's certainly memorable. Course I never saw it. Until recently. And I totally think it was worth the watch. Unfortunatley thought I watched it over the course of a couple days, so my viewing was very chopped up and I actually had to rewind it to catch some things I'd missed when I was drifting off to sleep late at night on my first viewing. It's campy, and silly, and strange, and very my kind of movie. It's basically a B movie, but a good one. My favorite parts were of course - if you know me - the really random things that happened or that people said. And of course the end was great. Though, the movie falls short of being really good, only because the lead actress (who has a sort of wierd plain face, but a great body) never took it off. Don't Waste my... time!! ... B,B+ --This text refers to the DVD edition
Rating:
Summary: One of my favorite films - but where are the extras?
Review: "Repo Man" has been one of my favorite films for years. But I was disappointed that this "special edition" wasn't a little more special. The director created a different version of this movie for TV that included extra scenes not in the original. I would have really liked to have the extra scenes included here or at least have both versions. Still, it's a great movie and worth having.
Rating:
Summary: The more you watch it, the more you get.
Review: Back in 80's, I watched this movie with my friends about 100 times.(This was done in one summer...yes...we're a little odd). I agree with the rest of the reviewers how great the movie is. Let me introduce a different aspect. The more you watch the movie, the more you find to laugh about. Aside from the obvious labeling of beverages as "drinks" when the character refers to them as "drinks" and changes to "beer" when referred to as "beer", there are hundreds of treasures to find. After about the 50th viewing, we noticed the railroad crossing that did not have any train tracks. The TV in the parent's house is very entertaining as well. hahaha Enjoy the show!
"Let's go get sushi... and not pay" - Duke P.S. Plate of Shrimp.
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