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Repo The Genetic Opera vs Repo Men the debate continues

I begin this article with a story. This story is about a genre fan who loves and supports low budget horror/scifi movies. A fan who watches EVERY syfy original movie. A genre fan who for

years has been told how much he would love Repo: The Genetic Opera. This fan finally found the time to watch Opera and was very displeased, uninterested and turned it off after only 26 minutes, (He was finished after 15) and was left wondering why any of these people who supposedly knew him well assumed he would enjoy it so much? In case you're wondering this fan was me.

First things first, I usually don't like mucals that aren't animated Disney features, Tenacious D, or Travolta oriented. I feel very strongly I must connect with the universe of a film to enjoy it. nce I have never seen anyone spring up in song and dance in any given real life tuation I can't get into it. The mucal numbers tend to ruin the other parts of the film.

So when I am watching a mucal it has to be really cool to keep my interest and attention. So far none have captured me enough to really accept the reality of song and dance. What we get in the Opera is a group of wannabe counter cultures trying to dip into the late 90's and early 2000's numetal look and sounds. The Hot Topic craze is full swing in this movie. There is a plot somewhere about removing organs and such, but I couldn't really get into the story because of the really really lame muc and dance (Just my opinion folks). I did notice Paris Hilton and was very happy to see Giles from Buffy the Vampire slayer, but that's about it. I could suffer no longer and quit watching...

When I first heard of Repo Men I immediately thought it was going to be cool. It has some really cool actors in Jude law, Forest Whitaker, and Liev Schreiber at his most sleazy. The story follows childhood friends Remy and Jake who work for the Union as repo men who collect Organs from people who are past due on payments. This movie has a great and steady pace. Something most sci-fi movies tend to lack opting for a slow prodding approach.

The movie delivers more than just a steady plot, but also great visuals, muc/score (an excellent jazz club scene. Every movie should have a jazz bar scene) and great acting. I believe this to be one of the best sci-fi movies of the decade maybe of all time.

Some (or most for that matter) would disagree. In fact some people are so loyal to Opera that they search for any reason to claim that Repo Men was a blatant rip off. These fans have posted blogs, and even gone so far as to harass Garcia (author of Reposseson mambo) on amazon. No doubt, trying to ruin him and his career.

The milarities are great and plenty and the minds behind Opera have been claiming plagiarism and have produced their history. Bousman (director of Opera) posted this in a very long account of their history...

REPO! THE GENETIC OPERA started in 1999 with the creation of ‘THE GALLERY’ – a �-man performance troupe. Its founding members, TERRANCE ZDUNICH and DARREN SMITH, wrote and produced ’10 Mi�e Opera’s’ whic�h�went on to perform at Night Clubs and Coffee Houses around the Los Angeles area.

The blog [hich can be seen here http://www.darrenlynnbousman.com/a-brief-lesson-in-history-repo-vs-repo/comment-page-1/#comment-366 is a detailed account of their history and I must say while reading it I began to believe that Opera was a genuine idea they came up with on their own and that they believe to have done it first. The odds of them finding a short story from the year 1997 written by Repo Men scribe is pretty small. HOWEVER

Eric Garcia didn't come out of nowhere to write Repo Men. He was already a successful author, whose novel Matchstick Men was made into a 2003 Ridley Scott film. Garcia wrote the story that contains the premise of repossesng body parts in 1997. It was published at the end of the year. That's almost two years before the Opera crew created their story.

So maybe everyone is overreacting? Maybe this is a case of two separate artists coming up with milar art. Which is what I believe to be the case, but the outrage from Opera fans has made me hate the film even more. The fans of Opera have essentially become what they hate.

The Repo! Army (name of Opera fans united), which largely consts of the people who were the victim of bullies, started to become bullies themselves. They assumed that Repo Men a film none of them had seen, was a sleazy Hollywood ripoff. Many of them began to take it out primarily on Eric Garcia, co-author of the Repo Men screenplay and author of the book Reposseson Mambo that the screenplay was based on. The Repo! Army went to war, and began posting negative reviews of Garcia's work on Amazon, started letter writing campaigns against journalists writing about Repo Men! and threatened protests.

The opera fans are so dedicated to this myth that it was ripped off they even create false lies. I found this on a blog # Posted by Tessa on March 17, 2010 at 12:42am

Repo! The Genetic Opera: Back in 1996, creators Darren Smith and Terrance Zdunich

produced the opera on-stage as “The Necrome�ant’s Death”, whi�later t�ed into a full-length performance under the title we know now. After a 10-minute film veron was shopped around, Lionsgate picked it up and turned it into a feature film.

Did you catch the lie? This person is so wanting of a war they even lied about the year Opera was created. As posted earlier by the Director of the Film (Darran Lynn Bousman) and good friend of the creators, It was not created until 1999. This fake year created on some idiots blog is propaganda. Notice how they chose to say 1996, which is a year before Garcia's short story was published.

It is actions like these that make me cringe at the fact Operas creators are still upset. They don't even care to have straight facts. They would rather have people lash out at an innocent author and film then admit that they have no merit in these claims.

In clong there are many milarities between Opera and Repo Men, and at first the idea of plagiarism was a viable concern. However, after looking at the facts it's the accusers who should be blamed for theft of intellectual properties. It is also posble that these artists came up with a really cool concept and should both be praised for their work and dedication and not ostracized. Instead of debating which one came first, like the chicken and the egg, just t back and enjoy your opera and allow those of use who don't enjoy our movie. Genre fans should be united.
MisfitSquid Saturday 5/28/2011 at 11:03 PM | 76920