Some directors just can’t help but wear their influences on their sleeves. While some may scoff at a first-timer taking these measures, let us not forget when Quentin Tarantino made his grand cinematic entrance with Reservoir Dogs 18 years ago. Director Miguel Sapochnik may not be up to the standards we now expect from Tarantino, but his debut film Repo Men is definitely a hodgepodge of many movies we’ve already seen.
Repo Men is based on the novel The Repossession Mambo, adapted by its author Eric Garcia (also author of the highly under-seen Matchstick Men) and co-written by TV vet Garrett Lerner. It must be fun to adapt one’s own novel for the big screen as it could either allow the author to condense some things while expanding others or possibly do both at the same time. If the original novel is anywhere near as much fun as the film is, at times it probably makes for a fantastic beach or airplane read.
Set in the near future, a company called The Union has developed a way to manufacture any organ one could possibly want in life if it were to need replacing. But it’s not just the organs that come with a price. The Union is outfitted with their own brand of repo men who are dispatched to reclaim your organ if you run past due on payment. The best repo men in the business happen to be lifelong friends, Remy (Jude Law) and Jake (Forest Whitaker).
Remy and Jake make good money harvesting organs back for The Union but Remy’s chosen profession is beginning to take its toll back at home. His wife Carol (Carice van Houten) nags him every chance she gets to talk to his boss, Frank (Liev Schreiber), about making a move from repo to sales. Jake knows that repo is what’s in Remy’s heart and is put off by Remy even contemplating a change in profession. But after Carol and their son Peter (Chandler Canterbury) witness Jake performing a drive-by repo in the back of a taxi, she gives Remy an ultimatum and leaves with son in tow.
Remy wants to do good by his wife and decides to take one last job but things go awry as a faulty defibrillator sends Remy to the hospital where he wakes up to find himself under the worst worker’s comp settlement ever. The Tin Man has been given a new heart but after his first solo night back on the job he finds that his heart’s just not in it anymore. He never wanted the heart implanted but knows that death is the only way out so it’s business as usual with Jake at his side; but of course Remy can’t keep up on his payments.
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Article comments
1 - A.S.
Seems like the novel was based on the movie script. Repossession Mambo was not published until 2009, well AFTER 'Repo Men' ended filming.
And no mention of the extremely similar, and first to the scene, Repo! the Genetic Opera? Clearly it was an influence if not outright stolen from...
2 - ATTK KAT
Considering Repo The Genetic Opera was a ten minute opera, a short film, and even an off-Broadway show way BEFORE Repossession Mambo came out you know the idea just had to have been stolen...
3 - Cars
Leonardo DiCaprio was going to star in Repo Men but dropped out. It seems the collaboration between the script and novel started in 2003, and the two were developed in parallel until the release of the novel in 2009.