The Mount Holyoke News

Issue date: 2/12/09 Section: Entertainment

The man stared at our group of six, his eyes wide in a sort of horror as he squeezed his milkshake. After a moment, he finally asked the question that had been lingering in the back of his mind. "Are, uh... you guys going to a party?" I smiled brightly at him from behind my black lipstick, veil and top hat and replied, "No, we're going to a movie." Dressing up to go to cult movies has been a tradition for a long time, since The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but we weren't going to see Rocky. Instead we were going to the cult film for a new generation, Repo! The Genetic Opera.

Like Rocky Horror, Repo! has its roots in the stage. Originally, Repo! was one of a series of what creators Terrance Zdunich and Darren Smith called "Ten Minute Operas." The most popular of them was called The Necromerchant's Debt, which told the base story of a grave robber who owes a debt to an organ Repo-man. When the story extened to a full length opera, it was directed by a young Darren Lynn Bousman who would then go on to direct Saw 2, Saw 3 and Saw 4. He promised them that someday he would turn Repo! into a film.

After much fighting, and being turned down many times, a film was made, and it had some amazing casting, just based on the "W.T.F why are these names together?" factor: Spykids' Alexa Vega, Goodfellas' Paul Sorvino, Buffy's Anthony Head, world famous soprano Sarah Brightman and Paris freaking Hilton. Despite initially receiving good buzz at the 2007 Scream Awards, the release date of this movie kept being pushed back further and further.

In many ways, Repo! became the little film that could. At one point, Repo! had been designated to direct to DVD status. Enter the fans. The Repo! movie web site was created at that point, and fans started connecting. www.Repo-opera.com is a site that offers message boards and chat-room and rare glimpses into the movie making process. In the chat-rooms and on the message boards, Bousman and Zdunich interact with fans, answering questions, talking and sometimes just coming in at late hours to chat when they couldn't sleep. Despite Liongate Film's contention that there was no audience for this movie, a community began to grow around a film that most people hadn't even seen yet. People started to demand the movie be shown, forming what would become the Repo Army. Due to the demand, LGF offered one screen per showing. The fan demand rose and one screen was extended to two, then four and finally seven screens opened the movie on Nov. 7, 2008.

Continued...

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