As a teenager there were 3 videos that were watched avidly by myself and a couple of mates, the Blues Brothers which had to be watched at B's house as his dad had procured a copy and a load of other not so good films from a video shop that went bust, the reason we had to watch it at his house was due to the fact that it was on Betamax and he was the only one that had a Betamax machine. B's dad was into gadgets and also had plenty of money so he was the first to have all the latest shiny new technology such as a home computer, video games and the first place I ever saw a Bang & Olufsen hi-fi but I digress.
The other two films were Diner, which I have talked about before; from about 1984 until I realised that he was a twat round about 1989 when Wild Orchid was released I kind of idolised Mickey Rourke and eagerly watched for each film to be released that he was in which did include a couple of howlers, A Prayer For The Dying and 9 1/2 Weeks. And finally there was Alex Cox's Repo Man.
Repo Man was the story of a young disillusioned punk that gets a job hanging about with a bunch of social misfits, repossessing cars and tracking down the holy grail for Repo Men, the car which will end all their money worries, a Chevy Malibu which may or may not have rotting alien cadavers in the boot. It is a bizarre and incredibly funny film which gets better with every watch and has a couple of great performances from Emilio Estevez and Harry Dean Stanton not to mention the inept punk gang.
The Soundtrack to the film is also brilliant, it features the talents of 80s American punk bands most of whom I had never heard of before, such as the Plugz and The Circle Jerks. It is also memorable for containing the best track Iggy Pop produced during that decade, the title track for the film and which included a rather vicious guitar riff courtesy of Steve Jones. The album is worth having if you can find it, my vinyl copy is absolutely buggered but I did manage to track down a cd a few years ago.
Here are a couple of tracks from the album.
Iggy Pop - Repo Man
The Plugz - Hombre Secreto
5 comments:
It's one of those must see films I've never seen, along with Psycho and Apocalypse Now. Iggy's, Steve Jones assisted album Cold Metal is well worth checking if you haven't yet..
My parents got me and my sister out of bed on a school night to watch the Blues Brothers when I was a kid...grogy, I stumbled into the living room to John Lee Hooker and Boom Boom Boom.
One of my favorite movies. Harry Dean Stanton is one of the most underrated actors, Repo Man and Paris, Texas are both essential viewing. And a mighty soundtrack.
If you ever watch Repo Chick don't say I didn't warn you!
I spent too long trying to find the Jonathan Richman album that had the version of Pablo Picasso you hear in the film. Life were tough before the internet.
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