MOVIE REVEIW: REPO MEN

In my opinion there are several different categories when describing the quality of a movie. There are great movies and horrible movies, there are movies that are as I call them good one time watches like The Road. It was a fantastic movie, but nothing I would really want to watch again. Then you have one of my favorite categories, the awesomely bad movie. An awesomely bad movie is neither good or bad. It is a movie that despite the fact that it may not have the best story, or it is a little far fetched, it keeps you highly entertained. Some examples are Starship Troopers, Snakes On A Plane and Armageddon. Some of the stories are completely unbelievable, some of the acting was bad, but boy were they entertaining. And if you stop and think about it, not all movies have to be believable, they are stories just like books. I'm not making excuses for bad films, but I am a fan of the awesomely bad movies. For the most part, Repo Men was an awesomely bad movie. It is a mix between Minority Report and The Island, a good film and a bad film.

In the future, if you liver goes out, no problem. You can get an artificial one for a monthly fee that will fit your style of living. But much like you house and car....if you can't make the payments, someone will come to reposes it. That is what Jude Law and Forrest Whitaker's characters do in this film. Remy (Law) and Jake (Whitaker) are the best when it comes retrieving organs with owners that have past due payments. When Remy is electrocuted by a faulty defibrillator, he has to get an artificial heart to survive. After a few months, Remy starts falling behind on his payments and soon he becomes the very person he use to hunt down. Remy is forced to go on the run and Jake is forced to decide if he will stay loyal to his friend or job.

The first part of this movie starts out entertaining enough. Remy and Jake are going around repossessing organs, the movie is moving along at a pretty good pace. Then once Remy has the artificial heart put in,the film just comes to a halt for about forty minutes. The story then focuses on Remy and his struggles with returning to the Repo team after the accident, struggling to make payments and his family issues. I realize that you can't have two hours of just action, but they made this part of the film extremely boring and dull. The film finally picks back up after they have to go and try to reposes Remy's artificial heart.

What really hurts the film besides the middle part of the film are all the plot holes. Now obviously, this isn't a film that is supposed to have a lot of depth when it comes to the story, but they had some pretty big misses. One was his family. At first his wife is having him choose between her and their son, or his job. Then once he is on the run and his wife has kicked him out, he just picks up another girl who is late on payments and just hooks up with her without a thought about his wife. Secondly is Jake's character. When Remy is kicked out, Jake lets him move in with him, but yet when he starts falling behind, he never offers to lend him any money, but instead gets mad at him for having trouble doing his job. Plus, he has a a well paying job, nice car and a huge house. You think he would have been able to stay on top of he payments longer than he did.

There were some things I think the film was successful at. First was the action scenes. I was very impressed with the fight scenes in the film. Normally, a film like this has pretty weak action sequences and this one in my opinion delivered. The second was Forrest Whitaker's performance. When I first saw the trailer, I asked myself why in the world an Oscar winner with talent like Whitaker would take this role. But after watching the film, while I still think it was probably a dumb role choice for him, I think he did a good job at portraying Jake as the out of control, selfish best friend. And finally, the twist. I love a movie with a good twist at the end, and this had a good twist at the end. Now for some like myself, you can probably see the twist coming, but if you have no clue and and miss a certain part of the film or aren't paying attention, it will definitely catch you by surprise.

This film could have been better. I would have given it a three and a half, but the middle section and the plot holes really drug it down too much for me. I give it a two and a half.