Repo Man

Alex Cox's film is a cult sci-fi satire from 1984. It stars Emilio Estevez as a young punk taken under the aged wing of Harry Dean Stanton's repo man.

The plot finds Estevez's slacker quitting his dead end job, and tricked into helping Stanton hijack a car, thus hastily welcoming into his new repo career. The film becomes more complicated by rival repo men, Estevez's old punk gang, the FBI and an alien body.

Estevez does his usual schtick of looking a bit pissed off, but it's still one of the better roles I've seen him in. Stanton plays it straighter than I've seen him, which is odd considering the rest of the film is so strange. After the initial friction, common in most buddy movies, the two eventually grow used to each other, and Estevez is trained in the dangerous world of repo men. This, he comes to realise, is full of shootouts, menacing grandmothers and car chases.

Repo Man is often cited as a punk sci-fi- it reminded me of the slacker films of US indie in the 80/90's. The soundtrack is part mariachi, part punk rock, a surf guitar rumbling throughout the film. Elsewhere, Iggy Pop and the Circle Jerks enforce its punk credentials. I really liked the fact that Cox mixed the film/punk formats- I'd like to see more collaboration between rock music and film.

The sci-fi element comes in the form of the aliens and the FBI. The main subplot of the film is the journey of the alien lifeform stuffed inside the boot of the car. The FBI, rep men and alien believers are all on the trail of the radioactive vehicle. Cox ekes some humour out of the situation, but I wouldn't say the film is a broad comedy. Farcical, but not laugh-out-loud funny.

7/10