Repossessed! *spoiler alert*

Repo Men (2010)
Director- Miguel Sapochnik
Starring- Jude Law, Forest Whitaker, Alice Braga

Remy (Law) and Jake (Whitaker) work for a company that manufactures replacement organs for transplant recipients.  Their job is to track down those who are over 90 days overdue on their payments, then take the organs back, leaving the the unfortunate recipient to die where they lay.

Remy and Jake love their jobs, and are very good at them, too.  Remy's wife, however, doesn't share his enthusiasm for his work and urges him to get transferred to a department that isn't quite so bloody, and that lets him spend more time with his family.  Remy cannot stay away from his job, though, and the wear on his family becomes so much that she eventually leaves him.

During a heart repossession, Remy suffers a serious shock from a bad defibrillator and must have his own heart replaced as a result.  His efforts to try to resume life "as usual" are hindered by the fact that he now feels empathy for those recipients he's repossessed from, and can no longer perform those duties.  He tries one of the "safer" departments like sales, but finds he cannot pressure people into buying new organs without being honest and warning them of what will happen should they be unable to pay.  He is soon fired, and cannot afford to pay for his own replacement.  Instead of submitting to his best friend and former coworker, Remy goes on the lam and searches for a place where he won't be found out.

He soon finds Beth (Braga), a woman who' also running away from repo men.  Beth's transplants seem to take up half of her body, all black market.  Together the two try to make their way out of the country to live peacefully.

This movie was a lot better than I had originally anticipated.  I figured it would be a goofy, dystopian future society with a lot of digital stuff being thrown in.  It was actually more realistic, closer to society of today, only with a few changes in business policy.  The gadgetry was a little high-tech (like the scanners that detected the transplant), but not over-the-top.

Acting was solid all around.  The ending started to get a little cheesy, but then decided to turn around and give you a serious mindwarp right in the last few minutes.

Rating:  3.5/5 Bonedaddies.

Hero in Lunatic Fringe

Franklyn (2008)
Director- Gerald McMorrow
Starring- Eva Green, Ryan Phillipe, Sam Riley

The lives of three strangers become intertwined and deeply affected by a masked vigilante in an alternate world.  Emilia (Green) is an artist who struggles with her mother's detached nature and attempts suicide once a month as part of an art project.  Milo (Riley) was dumped before his wedding, and returns to pursuing a childhood sweetheart.  Peter (played by Bernard Hill) searches the streets for his son who escaped a mental hospital.  Last, but by far not least, Jonathan Preest (Phillipe) wears a mask and battles religious oppression in the darkened Meanwhile City while searching for a girl abducted by the cult-leader named The Individual. 

While none of these lives seem related to one another, it becomes apparent that they are connected not only through some personal interactions but also because of the level of suffering and apparent mental instability involved. 

Emilia not only suffered mother's neglect, but father's abuse.  Milo's childhood sweetheart was not what he thought she was, nor is what he thinks she is, forcing him to deal with reality on terms not his own.  Peter, perhaps the most sane in the group, comes close to finding his son, but at tremendous cost.  And Preest?  He comes to realize his reality is flickering as it becomes more difficult to focus on enacting vengeance on The Individual. 

The acting was a bit over-the-top at times, though it seemed well-fitting in with the surreal nature of some of the scenes of the movie.  Transitions between one world and the other were smooth; realities were not confused with one another, but also the switch was not jarring to the viewer. 

Special Effects were great in this movie.  It played well as a superhero/fantasy movie, but switched gears into mental-illness drama with no weird incongruence in how the effects were utilized.  The costume, though somewhat basic and reminiscent of the Watchmen's Rorshach, was still pretty cool. 

The lives of these four come together at last toward the end in a dramatic, bittersweet finale.  All in all, it was a weird movie that dealt with mental illness in a way I haven't seen done much in cinema, but very much liked.

Rating:  4/5 Bonedaddies.

Depths of Obsession

Deep End (1971)
Director-Jerzy Skolimowski
Starring- Jane Asher, John Moulder-Brown, Karl Michael Vogler

15-year-old Mike (Moulder-Brown) experiences life as an employee in a public swimming pool/bath house. He meets some strange women, including one who sexually abuses him in a strange, not-very intrusive way, but becomes obsessed with his coworker Susan (Jane Asher), who is not only engaged, but is also seeing the lascivious swimming instructor (Vogler).

Despite her engagement and pool flings, she still flirts a bit with him, enticing him all the more to be with her at any cost. He begins following her to places like he theater, restaurants, even home. She seems to fluctuate between enjoying it, tiring of it, and enjoying it again throughout the movie.

One day, after crashing a foot race organized by the swimming instructor, Mike decides to pop the tires of the man's car, which had been loaned to Susan for the day. Susan chases Mike in a rage, and ends up losing the diamond on her engagement ring in the snow. They decide to bag up the snow surrounding them and take into the pool after hours to thaw, which leads to an awkward tryst and a downbeat ending.

The pacing in this movie wasn't great. There were times it seemed to drag on, and Mike got himself into places that didn't seem to go anywhere in the movie. At one point he finds a nude cardboard cutout of Susan in front of a peepshow, suggesting she is much more well-known to men than he had previously known, but no more explanation is given.

Despite the pacing, the acting was done well, and the minimal effects did nothing to take away from the effectiveness of the movie overall.

Rating: 3/5 Bonedaddies.

Another Day, Another Time Hole, Another Fantastic Thing

Time Bandits (1981)
Director- Terry Gilliam
Starring- Michael Palin, David Warner, David Rappaport

Young Vincent (Palin) gets caught up in a cross-dimensional crime spree run by employees of the "Supreme Being", using a stolen map of the universe. The time-jumpers are led by Randall (Rappaport), and are actually on the job of fixing time holes, using the opportunity to loot what they can before closing the hole up.

During their adventures, they meet various historical characters, such as a very polite Robin Hood (nailed down in Monty Python style by John Cleese), and King Agammemnon (played by a young non-yet-bald Sean Connery). They also find a time hole that places them precariously on the Titanic before they finally attempt to find the "most fantastic thing", placed in their heads by the Evil Genius (Warner), who want to understand "technology" (VCR's, cameras, etc) in order to control the universe, and therefore control the Supreme Being.

The effects were decent enough for 1981, the pacing and acting were brilliant--I don' think this movie could have been effectively pulled off without the slight Monty Python flavors added. It was also cool to see midgets(?) playing a heroic role here (or maybe antiheroic) instead of being given stereotyped munchkin-style roles. Their personalities definitely trumped any size differences.

The weird thing? This movie makes more sense than Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.

Rating: 4/5 Bonedaddies

Midnight Spaghetti (Spoiler Alert)

El Topo (1970)
Director- Alejandro Jodorowsky
Starring- Alejandro Jodorowsky, Robert John, Mara Lorenzio

Gunfight el Topo (Jodorowsky) makes his way through a desert with his naked son seeking some kind of enlightenment. What that enlightenment is, exactly, I think is mostly known to the director/star himself.

The movie begins with the pair coming upon a village recently massacred. Bodies litter the streets and buildings, blood is puddled everywhere, and the one still-living inhabitant they find begs for death, a somber task el Topo leaves for his young son as a "life lesson".

Moving on, they take on a small group of bandits, then happen upon a group of monks being terrorized by more bandits, who are soon dealt with. El Topo leaves his son behind with the monks, and takes with him a woman who was being kept there "(Lorenzio)--he eventually names her Mara.

Being forced to prove his love for her, el Topo embarks on a mission to seek out four master gunfighters and best them in battle. The first is a blind guru who takes a shot to the head. The second is a gypsy who makes copper trinkets as a hobby. The third is a crackshot rabbit herder (yeah, you read it right) whose one-shot pistol and excellent aim ironically prove his undoing. The fourth no longer cares for gunfighting, and deprives el Topo of his victory by taking his own life--to prove how meaningless it is.

After he's accomplished the harrowing task, a cowgirl dressed in black (who decided to accompany them following the first major gunfight) shoots him up and leaves with Mara. A group of deformed underground dwellers find him and take him in. Somehow he survives the wounds, develops light hair, and decides to help the underground dwellers by digging a tunnel out, so everyone can live above ground with normal society.

He is accompanied in his dig by a little woman who eventually becomes his wife. He also runs into his son, who harbors some serious ill will for having left him so many years before (I can only guess he spent a lot of time underground). He agrees to put off killing el Topo until the tunnel is finished, even helping dig himself.

After all is finished, he finds he can't kill his own father and heads back into the nearby town. Meanwhile, all the deformed underground dwellers become overly excited about their new exit door and all leave at once. They are met at the outskirts of the nearby town by the paranoid townspeople, who subsequently open fire on them. El Topo makes it in time to see the last one fall, and is then shot down as well. His little wife, who has just given birth, takes off with his grown son, and that's that.

This movie, though confusing, kept my interest for the entire two hours, something that hasn't happened often with spaghetti westerns--at least, not since Django.

It is full of symbolism. The only hitch is that one must probably watch the movie a dozen times with some religious texts to try to catch what they can, or else contact Jodorowsky and ask him directly. I saw the obvious signs of hypocrisy and demented leadership, but never really got what el Topo was looking for all this time. Perhaps it was simple "enlightenment", maybe just a better home.

A strange midnight movie, to be sure, and an entertaining one, if for nothing else than the weirdness.

Rating: 3.5/5 Bonedaddies

Zombies, Chicks, Luchadors, and Dr. Satan--Oh My!

The Haunted World of El Superbeasto (2009)
Director- Rob Zombie
Starring- Tom Papa, Sheri Moon Zombie, Paul Giamatti

Famous (?) luchador El Superbeasto (Papa) must save a woman he's lusting after from the nerd-farious Dr. Satan (Giamatti), enlisting the help of his secret-agent/cheerleader-type sister, Susie-X (Moon Zombie) and her smitten robot sidekick.

Along the way he rescues a has-been luchador named El Gato, who was imprisoned by Dr. Satan a long time before. He is now know more for his weird googly-eyes and dragging scrotum than for any wrestling moves.

Throw in some Nazi-zombies trying to retrieve from Suzie-X their fuhrer's stolen head-in-a-jar, and you have a pretty big monster-romp of an animated movie.

Unfortunately, not all of the jokes are that funny--some even seem forced, despite coming from good actors, and a lot of the female characters are visually, if not mentally interchangeable.

Rating: 3.5/5 Bonedaddies.

A Hard Case To Defend

Hart's War (2002)
Director- Gregory Hoblit
Starring- Collin Farrell, Bruce Willis, Terrence Howard

Within the bleak atmosphere of a WWII POW camp, Lt. Thomas Hart (Farrell) must use his limited law school education to defend a murder case involving Tuskegee pilot Lt. Lincoln Scott (Howard) and another POW. Hart knows that Scott has been falsely accused, and knows Col. William MacNamara (Willis), unofficial leader of the prisoners, has something to do with it.

The movie quickly becomes heavily racially charged with arrival of the two African American airmen, and tension is almost constant throughout most of the movie. Col. Verner Wisser, acted incredibly by Marcel Lures, is a strong character, and despite being a "villian" in the movie still manages to force some respect from the viewer, especially toward the end. Wisser and MacNamara share what can be best termed a 'hateful friendship'. Wisser actually seemed broken when he learned of MacNamara's involvement and motives, and what actions he must take in retaliation.

The movie was visually arresting with flat colors and amazing special effects that didn't dominate the film.

Rating: 4/5 Bonedaddies.