Heading the company responsible for financing organs to people, and repossessing them via murder, is GeneCo founder and all-around terrible rich person Rotti Largo played by the legendary Paul Sorvino (Goodfellas). That aside, what’s being sung about? Well, the core premise of Repo centers around a world in which mass organ failure and death have created a new market of organ financing as a way to cheat death, and organ repossessions if you fail to make a payment after 90 days. Some of it really works, and some of it… well, really doesn’t. It’s all sung, the whole thing, and it’s exactly as “hit or miss” as you might think. However, part of the problem with the film as cited in many of its poor reviews is the fact there’s almost 0 spoken dialogue. The music genre being rock is a stellar idea in and of itself, and there are some fantastic tracks on offer like Zydrate Anatomy.

Repo was marketed as a “rock opera” so first and foremost, the film is a musical both conventional and unconventional. However, in a similar vein as The Rocky Horror Picture Show, or perhaps like The Room or the Shrek movies, Repo has garnered a solid cult following over the years.

Repo: The Genetic Opera, released in 2008, was a massive flop for Saw director Darren Lynn Bousman. Nothing huge that’ll ruin the movie for you though, so if you’re curious I definitely say check it out, even if only to get a better idea as to what the heck this movie is. Note that if you haven’t seen the film, I’m going to share some minor spoilers. Because many of my friends have already seen Repo: The Genetic Opera, I figured why not talk a bit about it here in a Cortex post. There’s value in watching films like that, rewatching to catch anything you might have missed, and especially in sharing those films with your friends to see their reaction. Still… something that’s interesting about weirdness in the Repo sense is that sometimes films become more likable over time simply because they’re strange. Not that that’s a bad thing, I’m a fan of everything weird and strange. After watching it last night, I can safely say the film is a lot weirder than I remembered. I’ve been rewatching some of my favorite movies from my teenage years lately, including an off-the-wall one called Repo: The Genetic Opera.

Repo the genetic opera mark it up