What film was produced by former Monkee Michael Nesmith, the godfather of junk, has a theme song by Iggy Pop, the godfather of punk, and features a green-glowing Chevy Malibu in a supporting role? Why, Alex Cox’s first feature, of course. His punked-out picture, slyly referencing that other great trunk trauma, Kiss Me Deadly, mixes a hardcore soundtrack, a radiant neutron bomb, alien conspirators, the seedy side of L.A., and some worldly-wise repo persons (Sy Richardson and Tracey Walter, a post-lysergic loony) in a brew that has an intoxicating half-life. Insistently “intense,” Emilio Estevez plays the neophyte repo taken under the tutelage of Bud (Harry Dean Stanton), poet laureate of deadbeats. The Repo Code: Never carry a gun, never harm a car. All is wacky well in the land of hot wires and cold jackings, until a sizeable bounty is posted for the aforementioned Malibu making its way to the sea. Then the torque is tightened. Cox’s cantankerous concoction is like a Penelope Spheeris film written by Nathanael West in residence at Area 51. The energy emitted by his semisurreal, punk-powered debut registers ten on the comic Geiger counter. Full exposure is preferred.

—Steve Seid

• Written by Cox. Photographed by Robby Müller. With Emilio Estevez, Harry Dean Stanton, Tracey Walter, Sy Richardson. (92 mins, Color, 35mm, From Universal Pictures)