It is the near future and organ failure is rampant. Enter GeneCo to finance organ replacement. And then enter RepoMen who reposess organs from those who can’t pay their installments.

This movie musical is based on a stage play and I kind of wish I would have seen the play instead. I love musicals and I love horror so I really like the idea of a musical horror but it’s tough to pull off. I think it’s pretty inevitable that musical trumps horror and the mere presence of showtunes takes away any scaryness that might be present. Sweeney Todd is an example of this. Sweeney Todd however is rolicking good fun. But in the case of Repo, the pacing was just too frenetic for me to keep up with.

In every musical I’ve ever seen the musical numbers are spaced out and tempered by spoken dialogue that acts as narrative but also as transitions between the musical acts. Repo makes it clear why these breaks are necessary. No such breaks were present here and my head almost exploded from the lack of downtime. All dialogue is sung and that sounds cool and innovative in theory but it just didn’t work. There was no time to calm down and absorb anything that happened because as soon as one musical number is over the next begins. I can see where the writers and director were going with this as I realize the over-the-topness is part of the point. It is meant to be high energy and chaotic and wild and it is but maybe I’m just too old and withered to be able to handle it.

As I said, I’d be curious to see the stage play because it might be more effective in that environment. Sometimes music just works better live and stage musicals are fun in a way that movie musicals have a tough time recapturing. I also feel that the writing isn’t exactly genius level and some of the lines were a little clunky, although they might be more amusing in a play, which can be more exagerrated and deliberately silly.

But that’s not to imply this film is a failure. The art direction is stunning, and the costumes are spot-on. I really enjoyed the interspersped comic book panels as story-telling device (maybe because they provided the only “down” moments in the whole film). Overall the look and feel of the film is cool and stylish.

The casting is hit and miss. It was great to see Anthony Stewart Head again (Gilles from Buffy) and surprisingly I found Paris Hilton to be perfectly cast (I almost avoided this film merely because of her presence but she is actually quite effective in her role). Sarah Brightman as Blind Mag is great and Ogre as Pavi was appropriately creepy but everyone else… meh.

Alexa Vega plays the main character and my opinion of her wavered throughout. Sometimes I felt her voice wasn’t ethereal enough for her appearance but then again, I guess the character as written is not really meant to be ethereal. She’s just a typical caged teenager who wants to be free and she embodied that sentiment quite well. It’s just that sometimes I wasn’t sure the typical teenager archetype worked for the pop-goth setting. And yet, the number where she rocks out about being seventeen is her best act in the show. So yeah. I’m all over the place on this one. Maybe I’m just tired of “girl victim” as protagonist. The stereotype is lazy and boring. So not really Alexa Vega’s fault there. Holy crap she’s tiny though. She and and some other actors as well as the director and writers were there to present the show and damn, on screen she looked normal but in person she’s like a miniature version of a real human being. Not that that’s relevant or anything, I was just stunned by her Poly-pocketness.

Anyhoo, if you like musicals and/or horror that is stylish but not actually scary in any way whatsoever you might enjoy Repo. It’s also worth it just for the coolness and originality but, you know, it’s not gonna win any Oscars or anything.

[rating:30]

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