You can always count on Alex Cox not to tow the party line. When he went into production on a movie called Repo Chick, Universal, which owns the rights to his 1984 movie, Repo Man, sent him a cease and desist letter saying he couldn’t make a sequel on his own. He ignored them, saying that other than the similar title, it wasn’t a sequel, it just had a similar name.
Now Universal has retitled the upcoming Jude Law and Forest Whitaker movie from Repossession Mambo to Reposessisson Men. Again, it’s not a sequel, but it does seem the name change might have been a way to make it more difficult for Cox to release a film called Repo Chick.
Now Cox has gone on the offensive, taking to his website to make the following statement.
“I anticipated the “cease and desist” letter from The Studio, attempting to stop production of REPO CHICK on the grounds that it was an illegal sequal to REPO MAN. That was inevitable, given the history of the company, whose parent – MCA – stood for “Muscle, Cash and Attorneys.” So, when a letter came, forbidding me to make my movie and signed by no less a personage than the Executive Vice President In Charge of Litigation, I stuck it in the drawer labeled ‘Restraint of Trade’ and carried on.
“REPO CHICK is a month from being done. She premieres in September, at the Venice Film Festival. Whereas most films get easier as you near the end, this one becomes more and more complex: a third of the backgrounds are in place now, but the rest of them – plus special effects shots from Collateral Image – are still to come.
“If studio goons had any brains, they’d buy REPO CHICK and market the bijaziz out of it as if it were a sequal to REPO MAN. It isn’t really; it’s a story of different characters in a different world: but truth never gets in the way of the marketing department, whether it’s pixels or Prozac. That I understand.
“What I wasn’t prepared for was the e-mail Jon Davison sent me today: an article reporting that “Universal’s embattled execs” were putting their big hairy monster picture on hold, and rushing out a film called REPO MEN.
“What?
REPO MEN is definitely not a sequal to my film. I still have a contract with these guys and – if they ever want to make a film based on my original work – they have to ask me to direct it. What fun that would be! But it seems The Studio has, among its souvenirs, a Jude Law thriller called THE REPOSSESSION MAMBO, shot in Canada, almost two years ago. I’m sure this is an excellent film, which Universal accidentally forgot to distribute, and now are passing off, in their innocence, as the new REPO MAN. Only a cynical person might see any attempt to catch the upward draft of REPO CHICK, and give loft to a turkey.
REPO CHICK ain’t REPO MAN, or REPO MEN. These MEN have nothing to do with me. For shame!”
While you have to admire Cox’s spirit, it’s difficult not to think his indignation is slightly hypocritical, as he’s basically doing exactly the same thing – making a movie with a title that sounds like Repo Man, but then saying it has nothing to do with that film. Why should he be able to do it, when the people who actually own the original movie can’t? It’s also true that you’d have to be an idiot to think the Law movie was a sequel to Repo Man, as it’s completely different, however it’s not a stretch to assume that a movie called Repo Chick, directed by Alex Cox, is a follow-up to the earlier movie.
Incidentally he’s wrong about Reposession Mambo being filmed two years ago, it was actually filmed last year, so it’s not that odd that it’s not coming out until later this year. I’d like to say I’m on Cox’s side on this one, but I’m not sure that I am.