Daniel Cromar
Let’s face it. In the past few years, it seems like there hasn’t really been anything new or interesting out in the horror movie genre.
Enter “Repo! The Genetic Opera.”
The movie tells the story of the world in the future, where an epidemic of organ failures gives rise to GeneCo, a corporation that makes it possible for ordinary people to get new organs through a financing program.
Fail to make your payments and your organs are repossessed by the repo man, or to quote a line from the movie, “He’ll just rip the still beating heart from your chest.”
Oh and by the way, it is a rock opera.
Not only that, it is a magnificent rock opera with an outstanding cast that is a bit of a surprise in and of itself. Alexa Vega, who also plays in the movie “Spy Kids”, is surprisingly good as Shiloh, a 17-year-old girl with a blood disease who is kept in her room by her overprotective father, Anthony Head, who just happens to be the organ repo man.
The biggest surprise however, comes in the form of Paris Hilton, who plays Amber Sweet, the daughter of Rotti Largo, played by Paul Sorvino, head of GeneCo.
You would not believe it, I saw the movie and I can hardly believe it, but Paris did a great job. I guess playing a spoiled heiress is just something she is used to, because she really sells it.
Other standouts include Sarah Brightman, opera singer Blind Mag, and Kevin Ogilvie, who played Nivek Ogre from Skinny Puppy, as Pavi Largo — another one of Largo’s spoiled children.
The performance that outshines all of the others came from Terrance Zdunich, who is also one of the writers and composers for the movie. He plays the grave robber, an outlaw who extracts a painkiller known as Zydrate from dead bodies, a crime punishable by immediate execution.
Zdunich also acts as a narrator for the film, although he really is not featured that much, which actually was one of the things that annoyed me, because when he was on screen, his performance was outstanding.
That brings me to the music. First of all, I have to say that “Repo” does suffer from what I like to call “opera syndrome,” which means that you can only sing every single line of dialogue for so long before it starts to get annoying.
That being said, the parts of the soundtrack that are not sung dialogue are nicely done. The best song in the movie, though in my opinion and those of several other people I’ve spoken with, is “Zydrate Anatomy”, sung by Zdunich and Hilton.
The grave robber is explaining to Shiloh what Zydrate does, and how you take it. It is basically a lesson on shooting up, and it is done in an interesting call-and-response style.
“Zydrate comes in a little glass vial. A little glass vial? A little glass vial.”
There are a few other memorable songs, all of which can be found on iTunes. If you want to get an idea of what the music is like, download these songs: “Zydrate Anatomy,” “Chase the Morning,” “Legal Assassin,” “Seventeen” (which features a completely random cameo by Joan Jett in the movie) and “Things You See in a Graveyard.”
There are a couple things that should be noted. The atmosphere and costumes are fantastic. Everything has a kind of horror feel mixed with a heavy metal music video, so it really fits together well.
While the story is very interesting, it does tend to jump around from time to time, particularly at the beginning.
Every now and then, things will just start happening, and it can be somewhat confusing.
While I definitely recommend this movie, there is one slight catch. It is only playing in one theater in the Los Angeles area, the Sunset 5 in West Hollywood.
I would suggest buying your tickets online before you go. The showing I went to sold out, as did a few others that night. It would be a drag to get all the way out to Hollywood only to find that there were no tickets left.
Overall grade: B
()
