Repo Men is, for the most part, a boring and overwrought trifle. It steals most of its ideas from “Repo: the Genetic Opera” and steals its visual concept of the near-future dystopia from Blade Runner. It’s been widely regarded as a sardonic commentary on our current state of American Healthcare, but I can’t believe that for a second. Repo Men is far too dumb to be a comment on anything.

In a world….

A megaglobocorp makes fancy artificial organs for people, but charges unbelievable prices for them. Desperate people sign unwise financing contracts to get them. When they miss payments, as the company knows they will, the company sends out armed collectors to take back the (now used and less valuable) property. The collection process is almost always fatal, but this does not seem to affect the company’s share price or attract much law enforcement attention. This business model is fraught with problems, and it’s hard to imagine how the company got to be so mega with such a dubious value proposition and such vast legal exposure. The movie does not address this.

Our protagonist is a repossessor of organs who is not much troubled by his line of work. Sure, his wife wants him to quit, but in action movies that’s pretty much all wives do. Well, that and leaving the hero when he won’t quit. Or getting shot.

One day, in the line of duty, he suffers a violent mishap and needs a new heart. He is given one without his consent and without an employee discount. He is distressed to learn of his new predicament, and this distress leads him to the moral and philosophical conclusions that a 10-year-old would have come to with no prompting at all.

The bulk of the movie is his quest to get off the radar of the corporation, and to establish some sort of life free of the looming globocorp. It also brings him into conflict with his best friend and repo partner. This role is played by the fantastic Forest Whittaker, but it makes only modest use of his talents.

I would have forgotten it already, let it blend into the sea of mediocre dark future movies we’ve been subjected to lately had it not been for one unforgettable scene. I guess this is a bit of a spoiler, but I’m in the mood.

Towards the end of the film there is a horrifying scene of amateur surgery/lovemaking that I may never be able to scrub out of my brain. It is beyond Cronenberg in its fetishization of the grisliest aspects of our bodies and you will probably be as sketched out about it as I was.

This horror is followed by a stupid faux happy ending – with a twist! The whole movie derivative and kinda stupid and I just saved you eleven dollars. Learn from my mistakes. Instead, rent Ghost Dog. Watch Forest be great. Don’t worry, there’s swords and whatnot.