Repo the Genetic Opera (Blu-ray) (2008)

"Stunning and original.  Bloody-Disgusting.com
"...an instant cult classic...  Joseph McCabe, FearNet
"...guaranteed to attain [cult status]...  Michael Gingold, Fangoria
"Stunningly original...a mind-blowing experience!  Paul Fischer, Dark Horizons
"Piles on the glam-rock spectacle and coal-black comedy...  Sean O'Neal, The Onion A.V. Club

Editor's Note Begun in 2002 as a Los Angeles stage production by writers Darren Smith and Terrence Zdunich, REPO! THE GENETIC OPERA was designed as a gory, comedic Grand Guignol to appeal more to club goers than fans of musical theater. One fan, aspiring director Darren Lynn Bousman, who has since worked on the SAW franchise, vowed to one day direct a film version of the show. Six years (and five SAW films) later, he has made good on his promise with a bizarre, gory, and unique piece of work that is as sure to entertain as it is to polarize its audience. In the year 2056, following an epidemic of human organ failure, the GeneCo Corporation--owned by the mafia-like Largo family--grows and installs new organs on a massive scale. The business, though, necessitates the employment of repo men to reclaim the organs from clients who miss their payments. Repo man and single father Nathan Wallace (Anthony Head, BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER) keeps his job a secret from his terminally ill daughter, Shilo (Alexa Vega), doing it only to pay for her costly medication. Nathan also has a secret history with GeneCo patriarch Rotti Largo (Paul Sorvino)---and their connection is about to become public knowledge on the night of a concert from popular singer--and GeneCo client--Blind Mag (Sarah Brightman). Compellingly strange, REPO! resembles a comic book-influenced goth dinner theater production set within a dystopian video game. Musically, the score concentrates more on libretto-like sung dialogue than memorable tunes (save Vega's pop-punk "Sixteen" and Brightman's chilling "Chromaggia"), but the cast appears to be having a blast. Skinny Puppy's Nivek Ogre lends some underground cred as the most twisted member of the Largo clan, but Brightman gives the comically bloody proceedings true legitimacy. A surprising casting choice, she's an almost regal presence, and her goosebump-inducing soprano soars stratospherically above this fun cult film in-the-making.

	Anthony Head
	Paul Sorvino
	Sarah Brightman
	Paris Hilton
	Bill Moseley
	Alexa Vega
	Terrance Zdunich
	Ogre
	Mark Burg - Producer
	Terrance Zdunich - Music
	Darren Smith - Screenwriter
	Daniel Jason Heffner - Producer
	Oren Koules - Producer
	Terrance Zdunich - Screenwriter
	Darren Smith - Music
	Joseph White - Director of Photography
	Carl Mazzocone - Producer
	Darren Lynn Bousman - Director

eFilmCritic.com 8 of 10
Cult films are best when they sneak up on the fringe audience, battling failure and disgrace to become something special, appreciated by a select few willing to cherish imperfection. "Repo! The Genetic Opera" is a motion picture that thirsts for alternative acceptance, positioning itself as a juicy piece of unlovable gothic muck that's guaranteed to turn off mainstream audiences, thus assuring it life beyond the normal distribution timetable. "Repo!" is horrifically calculated to appeal to outsider mentality, but it clicks together rather marvelously, riding an offbeat sense of the macabre to peculiar, yet quite interesting results...As much as "Repo!" impressed me, it's far from a perfect creation. Bousman's narrow depth of field reveals the production's limitations with a cringing severity, underlining actors trying much too hard to indicate and special effects that aren't very special. Also of irritation is Moseley, a fine genre actor who is miles out of his range when it comes to singing and dancing. His few moments onscreen are brutal to endure and break the spell "Repo!" is sweating hard to cast. After hearing Moseley's wounded pipes and watching his rigor mortis footwork, I think the world owes a heartfelt apology to Pierce Brosnan...The finale of "Repo!" lives up to its blown-out opera origins by serving up a volcanic display of tragedy and exaggerated sweep of fury. The film looks to close on a dramatically profound note, yet the entire picture feels caught up in a certain level of hysteria, leaving the last act push to gothic justice somewhat redundant. Still, "Repo! The Genetic Opera" lingers long after it ends, due in great part to a handful of memorable tunes and its persistent funky attitude, marked by an impressive desire to savor oddity and unconventional displays of heartache. - Brian Orndorf

USA Today 5 of 10
The biggest mystery about Repo! The Genetic Opera is why the grisly Goth-horror musical is opening the week after Halloween...The second-biggest mystery is why this unfunny, unscary, preposterous bloodbath about organ transplants is opening at all. And why did a serious singer like Sarah Brightman sign on and donate her pipes to this infernal, self-indulgent misfire?...Director Darren Lynn Bousman must have hoped to make a cult favorite along the lines of Rocky Horror Picture Show. And since he directed Saw II, III and IV, perhaps out of professional courtesy he didn't want to open on the same day as the most recent installment of the franchise. But such a macabre affair would seem to have a short shelf life...It's 2056, and an epidemic of organ failures has made transplants big business. As the operations grow more popular, surgery becomes a status symbol and fashion statement. Only the coolest people sport designer body parts and organ upgrades. Rotti Largo (Paul Sorvino), the malevolent head of GeneCo., offers easy financing. But miss one payment and the Repo Man (Anthony Stewart Head) comes a-calling, knife in hand...Paris Hilton plays a surgery addict, adding a bizarre glam factor. With forgettable tunes, from generic power pop to overbearing heavy metal, Repo! makes hackneyed observations about genetic engineering...Photographed in a murky style ostensibly to feel futuristic, the movie is a convoluted mess, rife with sado-masochism. As if that weren't enough, viewers must slog through a sappy conclusion, accosted by some of the most banal songs imaginable...Repo! might have been an SNL or MADtv skit, but as a movie, it should be repossessed by its financiers. - Claudia Puig