Repo Man

Written and directed by Alex Cox, Repo Man is the story of a young punk rocker who works with a repo man where they find a car that carries something mysterious in its trunk. The film is a mixture of sci-fi with elements of humor and commentary on culture clashes set in the Los Angeles punk rock scene. Starring Harry Dean Stanton, Emilio Estevez, Tracey Walter, Sy Richardson, and Olivia Barash. Repo Man is an extraordinary yet whimsical film from Alex Cox.

The film explores the world of men who repossess cars from those who have not paid their bills as one of them in Bud (Harry Dean Stanton) takes in a young street punk named Otto (Emilio Estevez) to be his protégé as they do their jobs where Otto learns the code of being a repo man. Yet, something strange is happening around Los Angeles as Bud, Otto, and their co-workers try to find a 1964 Chevy Malibu that is worth $20,000 as they have to deal with a rival repo company as well as street punks, and other strange forces who all want the car. Yet, there is something mysterious in that car where it could be something alien as Otto tries to make sense of everything while Bud wants it so he can gain financial independence.

Alex Cox’s script showcases a world that is kind of wild as it’s set during the early 1980s in Los Angeles where the L.A. punk scene was thriving and Otto is part of that world as he feels unhappy by his lame job at the supermarket and the fact that his hippie parents gave away his college money to a crooked evangelist. An encounter with Bud would give Otto something to do while finding something that is sort of dangerous and make some good money off of it. Yet, Otto would also encounter lots of strange things during his job including a young woman named Leila (Olivia Barash) who believes that aliens are coming to Earth as she and a mysterious driver named J. Frank Parnell (Fox Harris) are being tailed by scientists and government officials who want to know about what is in Parnell’s trunk.

The film features a lot of strange narratives that includes a trio of punks robbing places and stealing things, Otto getting his taste of the repo life, and dealing with rival repo men as they all want this 1964 Chevy Malibu that features a $20,000 reward. Many of which includes some humorous moments as well as some dark moments that would force Otto to look into what could be a bleak future as Bud becomes frustrated with the fact that his fellow workers don’t want to live the code that he likes to live by. It’s a film that definitely features a lot of genre-bending themes from the buddy-film to elements of sci-fi adventure where it could’ve been uneven and messy but Cox manages to find a way to bring it all together in its third act where everyone tries to go after the car.

Cox’s direction is very stylish for not just the way he presents early 1980s Los Angeles where it’s kind of messy and wild where there’s some poverty and such. Yet, it has this energy that is just intoxicating to watch from some of the scenes of Bud and Otto stealing cars where there is that sense of thrill to some of action involving the 1964 Chevy Malibu. Cox uses a lot of straightforward compositions as well as wide shots to play out the look of Los Angeles including some intimate moments to showcase the chaos of the L.A. punk scene. Cox’s direction also plays into the world of the repo business where many of the people Otto work with are men who have no qualms taking things away from people as it’s all about pay your bills or we will take your shit. Otto eventually learns the hard way about these rules as he would have a few bad encounters where things do crazy but he gets the job done.

Cox would also fuse the film with an element of sci-fi and horror as there is that element of mystery of what is in the trunk of this 1964 Chevy Malibu and who ever opens it pretty much gets burned to death. Even as the many rivals Bud and Otto have will all steal the car but will notice that something isn’t right where it becomes clear that there is something in the car. Even as Cox creates some scenes and characters that all play into that element of suspense where it would create this amazing climax involving the car as repo men and scientists face off to uncover the mystery of that car. Overall, Cox creates a very imaginative and exciting film about repo men trying to get a mysterious car for $20,000.

Cinematographer Robby Muller does brilliant work with the film‘s very colorful and evocative cinematography with the look of the daytime exteriors scenes to the gorgeous use of colors and lights for the interior and exterior scenes set at night. Editor Dennis Dolan does amazing work with the editing to play up the rhythm of the action and humor as well as slowing it down to play into the more suspenseful moments. Art directors J. Rae Fox and Lydia Burbank, with set decorator Cheryl Cutler, do terrific work with the look of the repo place Otto and Bud work at to the bars and clubs Otto and Leila hang out at. Costume designer Theda DeRamus does nice work with the costumes as it’s mostly low-key from the shirt-and-tie to the look of the punks.

The visual effects by William Cruse does excellent work with some of the visual effects from the way the people get burned after seeing the contents in the trunk of the Chevy Malibu to the look of the car when it glows late in the film. Sound editor Warren Hamilton Jr, does superb work with the sound to play up some of the atmosphere of the clubs as well as some of the sound effects such as gunfire and such to play into the chaos of L.A.. The film’s music by Tito Larriva and Steven Hufsteter is fantastic for its mixture of punk and low-key electronic music to play out its suspense and energy while music supervisor Kathy Nelson creates an exciting soundtrack that features music from such punk luminaries as the Circle Jerks, Black Flag, Suicidal Tendencies, Fear, and Iggy Pop doing the theme song for the film.

The casting by Victoria Thomas is great as it features some appearances from the punk band the Circle Jerks as a nightclub band, the Untouchables as a gang that Otto gets into trouble with, Dick Rude as Otto’s former punk friend Duke, Miguel Sandoval as Duke’s dim-witted friend Archie, Jennifer Balgobin as Otto’s former girlfriend Debbi, Zander Schloss as Otto’s former supermarket co-worker Kevin, and Del Zamora & Eddie Velez as the rival repo men in the Rodriguez brothers. Fox Harris is terrific as the very strange J. Frank Parnell who drives around the 1964 Chevy Malibu while Vonetta McGee is excellent as no-nonsense secretary Marlene. Susan Barnes is superb as the mysterious Agent Rogersz who has a silvery glove in her left hand while Tracey Walters is hilarious as the kooky Miller who always have some strange philosophies as he often intrigues Otto.

Olivia Barish is fantastic as Leila as this young woman with a fascination for aliens has her meeting Otto unaware of the trouble they’re in. Sy Richardson is brilliant as the very uncompromising Lite who carries a gun and does things to steal with no sense of morals at all. Emilio Estevez is amazing as Otto as this young man who is a point in his life where he deals with an uncertain future only to find thrills and such in being a repo man as he would later deal with some chilling consequences. Finally, there’s Harry Dean Stanton in a tremendous performance as Bud as this very no-nonsense guy who lives a certain code while always finding ways to get whatever he wants as he later deals with changing time and the prospect of being independent as he and Estevez have great scenes together in displaying the chemistry between old and young ideals.

Repo Man is a dazzling film from Alex Cox that features top-notch performances from Harry Dean Stanton and Emilio Estevez. The film isn’t just a funny and weird sci-fi comedy but also a very imaginative one that reveals men’s desire to find their way while dealing with strange forces. In the end, Repo Man is a phenomenal film from Alex Cox.

Alex Cox Films: Sid & Nancy - (Straight to Hell) - (Walker) - (El Patrullero) - (Death and the Compass) - (The Winner) - (Three Businessmen) - (Revengers Tragedy) - (Searchers 2.0) - (Repo Chick)

© thevoid99 2013

Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures

Directed by Jan Harlan, Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures is a documentary film about the life and works of one of cinema’s revered and controversial filmmakers of the 20th Century. With narration by Tom Cruise, the film explores the films that Kubrick has made in his career as well as the controversy he had received for each one. With filmmakers like Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Alex Cox, Alan Parker, Sydney Pollack, and Woody Allen providing insight about his work. The film also features interviews with Kubrick’s wife Christiane Kubrick as well as people and collaborators who appeared in his films like Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Jack Nicholson, Matthew Modine, Peter Ustinov, and Malcolm McDowell. The result is a fascinating documentary on one of cinema’s great filmmakers.

The documentary is balanced between the works of Stanley Kubrick as well as a look into his very private personal life that he had been guarding for so many years. Through Tom Cruise’s calm yet insightful narration, the film explores many aspect of Kubrick’s life including his childhood and his days when he worked as a photographer for Look magazine. While there’s not a lot of discussion of his early shorts with the exception of Day of the Fight, there are some discussion about his feature film work from Fear and Desire to Eyes Wide Shut.

While it is no surprise that many of his collaborators and the actors who appeared in his films will admit that Kubrick is difficult. Many of them reveal that a lot of the stories about Kubrick’s eccentricities and his meticulous detail where some of which were exaggerated by the press. There were more funnier eccentricities about the way he leaves notes to his family about taking care of pets. The film also features rare footage of Kubrick as a child as well as his family life with his wife Christiane and their children as his daughters discuss many of Kubrick’s persona as well as the fact that he didn’t like to do a lot of press coverage or be in the spotlight. One of them did reveal that just before the release of Eyes Wide Shut, Kubrick was planning to do a few interviews just to set things straight about what had been said about him.

The documentary also reveals a few things about the unrealized projects that Kubrick had wanted to work on. One was a bio-pic on Napoleon Bonaparte that he was fascinated by as he wrote a very detailed screenplay but shelved it due to the box-office failure of a period film similar to that called Waterloo. There were also brief discussions of his shelved 1990s Holocaust film Aryan Papers and the film A.I. Artificial Intelligence that he had storyboarded and conceptualized before turning the project to Steven Spielberg as a collaborative project. Spielberg along with other filmmakers also talk about Kubrick’s filmmaking style and the themes that he plays into his work.

Through the camera work of Manuel Harlan and editing of Melanie Viner Cuneo, Jan Harlan creates a film that is quite compelling and insightful as he’s also interviewed since he is Kubrick’s brother-in-law. Harlan allows the film to not just be a tribute to Kubrick but also a look into why people seem to love him just as a person. In the end, Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures is an extraordinary documentary about the revered filmmaker. It’s a film that fans of Kubrick must have as a companion piece to all of his films as well as an insight into the man who had been deemed as a taskmaster and such in his work. In the end, Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures is a wonderful documentary from Jan Harlan.

Stanley Kubrick Films: Fear and Desire - Killer's Kiss - The Killing - Paths of Glory - Spartacus - Lolita - Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb - 2001: A Space Odyssey - A Clockwork Orange - Barry Lyndon - The Shining - Full Metal Jacket - Eyes Wide Shut

Related: The Auteurs #18: Stanley Kubrick

© thevoid99 2012

Sid & Nancy

Originally Written and Posted at Epinions.com on 8/28/03 w/ Additional Edits/Revisions.

Whenever the movies enter the realm of rock n’ roll, it’s a hit-or-miss situation depending on what subject matter they’re doing. Some like 24 Hour Party People, Almost Famous, or Krush Groove can hit the mark while movies like The Doors or some lame TV music films VH1 make just miss the mark. The problem with some films based on music scenes or individuals is that they don’t please the musical elitists and historians who always check for something accurate and true. While some of the scenes in 24 Hour Party People did become exaggerated, they were at least entertaining but in Oliver Stone’s movie on the Doors, it completely became over the top and the story ended up becoming very inconsistent. In 1986, British filmmaker made a film about a rock icon, Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols in a movie about his love life with Nancy Spungen simply titled Sid & Nancy.

Directed by Cox and co-written with Abbe Wool, Sid & Nancy is about the couple’s self-destructive love life from 1977 to their downfall in early 1978 where Nancy was found dead at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City and February of 1979, Sid died of a heroin overdose. Playing the doomed lovers in their respective roles is Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb. The film shows how Sid meets the American groupie Nancy in Britain just as he just joined the Sex Pistols on bass while the band would self-destruct completely in America in early 1978 and Nancy would try to manage Sid’s career but both would succumb to their own addiction to heroin and their eventual downfall. While some of the historical portions of the film are inaccurate, Alex Cox doesn’t try to make Sid & Nancy a historical film with moment being played dramatically. Instead, Cox just focuses on the two and their love-hate relationship towards each other. While it’s not a perfect film, Sid & Nancy is an excellent, intense love story that is unconventional in its tone.

The film begins with the scene at the Chelsea Hotel in NYC where Sid Vicious is in shock over the dead body of Nancy. Her friend Gretchen (a then-unknown Courtney Love) is distraught while Sid is taken to a precinct where he is being interrogated by a detective (Biff Yeager) about Nancy. Sid looks back at how he met Nancy when he and Sex Pistols singer Johnny Rotten (Andrew Schofield) is destroying a Rolls Royce and waiting to meet up a friend and dominatrix named Linda (Anne Lambton). Linda introduces the two an American groupie named Nancy Spungen and Johnny of course, doesn’t like her but Sid does. Nancy decides to go to see the Sex Pistols that included guitarist Steve Cook (Tony London) and drummer Paul Cook (Perry Benson) where Sid beats up a journalist and plays with the band although he couldn’t play bass at all.

Later in the night, Nancy tries to have sex with Sid but Johnny doesn’t like Nancy since she likes to have sex like all Americans and the British thinks sex is just disgusting to watch. Then one day at a pub, Sid sees Nancy trying to score drugs from a rocker that fails and he feels sorry for her, as he wants to try heroin. Nancy takes his money and tells him she’ll be back in an hour to get some smack but doesn’t show up. Sid sees her a few days later after she tried to score more dope from another rich rocker but is angry that the rock star throws all her stuff. Sid helps her and tries smack for the very first time. Suddenly, a self-destructive relationship with the two ensues as they have love for each other and heroin.

Their relationship begins to bloom much to the disgust of the Pistols and their manager Malcolm McLaren (David Hayman) while they were performing on a boat, a mile behind the Queen of England’s boat on the day of her Jubilee. The boat trip was disastrous for all involved while Sid & Nancy evade from the cops and were in demand for more smack. Nancy called her mom for more money but refused as she smashed the phone booth in disgust. The two’s relationship deteriorates once Sid has to go to America for an upcoming tour as they break up.  The Sex Pistols' ill-fated American tour is marred by tension and Sid's dependency for heroin as he misses Nancy leading to the band's final show at the Winterland ballroom in San Francisco.

After the break-up of the Pistols, Sid flies to France to work on a solo record with the guidance of the corrupt McLaren as he passes out on a drug binge on the flight. Sid gets a surprise visit from Nancy as they fall in love through the eyes of Paris. Sid films a video for his hilarious cover of Paul Anka’s "My Way” with director Julien Temple where Sid shoots up many people including Nancy in a mock death scene where Nancy and Sid are in bliss over their love-hate trip of self destruction  The couple move to New York City at the famed Chelsea Hotel as Nancy tries to take over Sid's music career.  While they try to beat their heroin addiction through a drug counselor (Sy Richardson) with the help of methadone.  Things start out fine for Sid's music career until Nancy screw things up.  A meeting with Nancy's family becomes a disaster as the relationship between the two would lead to tragedy.

The film is a love story about two people who are really destined for each other now matter how fucked up they are.  Screenwriters Abbe Wool and Alex does a fascinating job in studying these two individuals as Sid is an inept musician with a penchant for being self-destructive and rowdy.  Nancy is a woman who brings both the best and worst about him as she is someone wanting to be with anyone who is famous.  Yet, Sid and Nancy are the kind of people who seem to thrive on self destruction and fucking this up no matter what happens.  When Sid isn't with Nancy, he can be really awful and on the verge of falling apart.

Alex Cox's direction is definitely entrancing in the way he presents the film.  Even though it's a very dirty, street-like type of film.  It also has some Cox's finest work to date as a director.  Some of it is attributed to the gorgeous cinematography of Roger Deakins.  Particularly in scenes revolving around drugs where there's a shot of Sid and Nancy kissing with garbage falling around them.  There's also a scene where the two are high on heroin and their hotel room is on fire.  It's where Cox finds the beauty in something can be very ugly and just downright disgusting.

Cox succeeds in a lot of things about the film including the punk scene.  Yet, there are some inaccuracies in the film such as the final Sex Pistols show at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco.  Still, Cox isn't striving for accuracy but rather a dramatic interpretation of the events that happened during the days of punk.  Then there's the film's climatic moment about what happened to Nancy where it's really an interpretation though to this day, no one knows what really happen.  Despite the flaws the film has, it is still a mesmerizing yet ugly love story.

The film does include several cameos, including Cox regulars Sy Richardson and Dick Rude, punk icons like Edward Tudpole, the Circle Jerks, and the Godfather of Punk himself, Iggy Pop with his then-wife Suchi in a scene in the Chelsea hotel. Even the film’s music from the Circle Jerks, Pray for Rain, the Pogues, and the theme song by late Clash singer Joe Strummer is well used, especially in the recreation of the Sex Pistols’ material by original bassist Glen Matlock and other musicians. The varied supporting performances work well but the best goes David Hayman as the corrupt Malcolm McLaren.  Andrew Schofield is interesting as Johnny Rotten as he stands out though his interpretation of the famous Sex Pistols/Public Image Ltd. frontman is inaccurate despite Schofield's snotty performance.

Chloe Webb is superb as Nancy Spungen.  Webb brings the right quality to a character who is quite unlikeable though she has her charms.  Even for someone who is truly a disgusting character who wants to do things right for Sid but is always a constant fuck-up.  It's a truly remarkable performance for a very underrated actress.  Finally, there's Gary Oldman in one of his many iconic film roles as Sid Vicious.  Oldman brings a wonderful humor and fragility to a character who is at times, dumb but is determined to become somebody.  Oldman creates a character that is truly amazing for a man who could or could have not killed the woman he loves.  Yet, he brings sympathy to a guy really tries to be famous and do right for Nancy.  It's definitely Oldman in what would be his breakthrough performance.

While it's not a perfect film, Sid & Nancy is an excellent film from Alex Cox featuring fantastic performances from Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb.  Audiences wanting a love story that isn't conventional and doesn't play to standards will enjoy this.  While audiences wanting to see the films of Alex Cox will see this as an excellent introduction though Repo Man is a better film.  Audiences interested in the world of punk will see this as a great fictional interpretation though the best stories about British punk are the Clash's Westway to the World by Don Letts and two documentaries by Julien Temple.  2007's Joe Strummer:  The Future is Unwritten about the late Clash frontman and 2000's The Filth & the Fury about the Sex Pistols.  In the end, Sid & Nancy is a remarkable yet chaotic film from Alex Cox.

(C) thevoid99 2011