I'll start off by saying that even as a huge Repo! fan and one of its biggest supporters as far back and the trailer's leaking in 2007, I was rather mixed with my feelings towards this movie. While I was happy to see the two Darrens and Terrance even getting any work at all. I'm friends with all 3 of them on Facebook and followed their updates about this religiously, but even then I couldn't help feeling a bit on edge about this film
For starters, I think the biggest problem can be found in its length: 55 minutes. For one, a film that has the mercy if being this short shouldn't feel padded out. But the problem is, it does. It runs 55 minutes and you'd think that should be more than enough time to fit an actual story, but the problem is, there's little story and tons of character porn. Character porn is a term I use to describe a production that has so many characters that it's practically overflowing, and that's exactly the problem here, instead of trying to focus on a story, it forces all these extra characters in and it feels excessive. Which is a shame because watching it, you get the sense that this production has tons of potential with it's fascinating concept of 3 people sent to hell and sent through a carnival where they're forced to face their sins and how they died- each set piece is a metaphor for Aesop's fables. The fables aspect is interesting but wasted here considering the only major tale touched upon is The Scorpion and the Frog, which leads to a rather unsavoury song called "Trust Me"
Speaking of which, the music. From what I hear, at the tours if you wanted to get an autograph from the folks attached, you had to drop 20 bucks on a soundtrack. Well, no bloody way could you force me to drop 20 bucks on this soundtrack when the music is so... dull. Part of Repo!'s charm was that it tried various styles of music- Italian folk music, industrial metal, electronica, punk rock, dance-pop and as many styles as there were, it all came together to form one extremely cohesive piece. Here, it's all carnival music and while there are a few good pieces, it feels like they went way too far with it. Some tracks don't even need to be songs ("MISS ME, MISS ME, NOW YA GOTTA KISS ME!"). The final track "Slither in the Mud" is a weird mix of awesome and terrible at the same time- it's always lovely to hear Zdunich's deep and velvety voice, but it can't elevate rather insipid songwriting. Oh and the credits. If I heard "la la la, it's off to hell we go!" Or "you're in the devils... CARNIVAL!" again I was going to murder everyone in the room
It's a shame because there's so much potential. Darren Bousman is extremely talented and sophisticated as a director, and Darren and Terrance are unparallelled as opera songwriters but when it comes to writing a more traditional musical they can't manage. The cast is impressive with Emile Autumn, much of the Repo! cast and Sean Flanery, but they're wasted and I didn't care about any of the main characters. It's pretty looking and has some interestingly entertaining bits but not enough
For starters, I think the biggest problem can be found in its length: 55 minutes. For one, a film that has the mercy if being this short shouldn't feel padded out. But the problem is, it does. It runs 55 minutes and you'd think that should be more than enough time to fit an actual story, but the problem is, there's little story and tons of character porn. Character porn is a term I use to describe a production that has so many characters that it's practically overflowing, and that's exactly the problem here, instead of trying to focus on a story, it forces all these extra characters in and it feels excessive. Which is a shame because watching it, you get the sense that this production has tons of potential with it's fascinating concept of 3 people sent to hell and sent through a carnival where they're forced to face their sins and how they died- each set piece is a metaphor for Aesop's fables. The fables aspect is interesting but wasted here considering the only major tale touched upon is The Scorpion and the Frog, which leads to a rather unsavoury song called "Trust Me"
Speaking of which, the music. From what I hear, at the tours if you wanted to get an autograph from the folks attached, you had to drop 20 bucks on a soundtrack. Well, no bloody way could you force me to drop 20 bucks on this soundtrack when the music is so... dull. Part of Repo!'s charm was that it tried various styles of music- Italian folk music, industrial metal, electronica, punk rock, dance-pop and as many styles as there were, it all came together to form one extremely cohesive piece. Here, it's all carnival music and while there are a few good pieces, it feels like they went way too far with it. Some tracks don't even need to be songs ("MISS ME, MISS ME, NOW YA GOTTA KISS ME!"). The final track "Slither in the Mud" is a weird mix of awesome and terrible at the same time- it's always lovely to hear Zdunich's deep and velvety voice, but it can't elevate rather insipid songwriting. Oh and the credits. If I heard "la la la, it's off to hell we go!" Or "you're in the devils... CARNIVAL!" again I was going to murder everyone in the room
It's a shame because there's so much potential. Darren Bousman is extremely talented and sophisticated as a director, and Darren and Terrance are unparallelled as opera songwriters but when it comes to writing a more traditional musical they can't manage. The cast is impressive with Emile Autumn, much of the Repo! cast and Sean Flanery, but they're wasted and I didn't care about any of the main characters. It's pretty looking and has some interestingly entertaining bits but not enough