"Blade Runner" discussion - 7/13/03 - 7/19/03

[Morticia]

This is a thread to discuss the technical and/or thematic merits of "Blade Runner."

The purpose being to foster intelligent discussion of films without resorting to "It's a piece of crap." or "It's the greatest film ever." (And so that we all can gain a bit of a film education from everyone.)

We'll discuss a new film each week. Either slade or I will post the film in this forum in advance, and lock the topic until the first day of discussion.

Thanks everyone. We are excited and we hope this works (we're open to any ideas of how to make it better).

****SPOILER WARNING**** of course this entire thread is going to be full of spoilers.

[reapersaurus]

I must be missing something, because how could Blade Runner, arguably one of the most influential and important science fiction movies ever made, not get ONE response?
Was this thread meant to be added to?

[lostwire]

I've seen Bladerunner at least two to three times a week for about 10 years now so it's safe to say this is probably my all-time favorite film. BR pulls me in like no other with its dazzling visuals combined with one of cinema's best scores by Vangelis... truly hypnotizing. Ridley was simply brilliant by using such a minimal amount of dialog & letting the score intertwine with the sights & sounds of the surroundings to elevate the futuristic city of LA to the film's main character.

There are so many beautiful poetic moments captured in this film:

The eyes (close-up refecting the city, all things mechanical, Hannibal's lab), the slight motion in the photograph of "Rachel & her mother", Graff's delicate origami & how it relates to Deckard's state of mind (except the unicorn)... to name a few.

[Notoriousaurus]

This movie has got to be on my Top 10 lists.

I prefer the theatrical cut, and apparently I am alone in that opinion. The Criterion Laserdisc is the pride of my collection.

[Dilmo]

Originally Posted by Notoriousaurus

This movie has got to be on my Top 10 lists.

I prefer the theatrical cut, and apparently I am alone in that opinion. The Criterion Laserdisc is the pride of my collection.

I have the Criterion Laserdisc, but it is the European version with more graphic violence. The narrative always bothered me. The studio thought we (the audience) could not follow it. Harrison Ford agreed on the needless narrative. I was waiting for a special edition to come out, but it looks far off, so I purchased the dvd for $7.50. One of my all time favorites.

[reapersaurus]

What I've always wondered is:
How much did Bladerunner actually influence/inspire cyberpunk?

Since William Gibson's Neuromancer is considered (AFIAK) to be the first cyberpunk book (or at least Gibson as the "Godfather of cyberpunk"), and it came out in 1984, while Blade Runner came out in 1982, couldn't BR be considered the genesis of almost every cyberpunkish story or film made?

[lostwire]

Here's what I know on the Cyberpunk issue.

I've read both Ridley Scott & William Gibson were very much influenced by the work appearing in the French adult-illustrated magazine Metal Hurlant, which was later published in the states as Heavy Metal in 1977. Just as Scorsese, Lucas & many others were pushing the boundries of film in the seventies, artists like Moebius, Caza, Druilett & Corben were pushing the limits of comic books. The artist who specifically grabbed their attention, & much of Hollywood, was Moebius (aka Jean Giraud) and a story he illustrated for Dan O'Bannon called The Long Tomorrow. If you ever get a chance to read it you'll be surprised at how much both Scott & Gibson were influenced by it's mood, feel, pacing, design & subject matter.

Aside from his ground breaking contributions to the comic world, Moebius has also worked on quite a number of films as designer & consultant. Here's just a few:

Bladerunner - Costume designer (uncredited)
Tron - Production designer
Alien - Conceptual artist
Willow - Conceptual artist
The Abyss - Conceptual artist
Fifth Element - Designer

Here's a pic of the out-of-print book where the serial from Metal Hurlant was gathered together under one cover. I'll see if I can scan a few panels & post them tomorrow.

[lostwire]

C'mon, I know there are more cats than myself who recognize this as one of the best film ever made.

[gozer]

liked Rutger Hauer's speech.

didn't realize what the unicorn meant until the second time i saw the movie. raised my respect for it ten fold.

[riboflavine]

One of the best movies ever.

I first saw this movie when I was about ten years old. I didn't understand it much, but it somehow left an impression on me. A couple of years later I taped it when it played on tv. I rewatched this tape many, many times. A while after this I saw the director's cut without the narration, at first I didn't like this very much as it seemed to make the film much slower paced. It was also around this time that I was talking to a friend about this movie and he mentioned that in the director's cut Deckard was a replicant. This had just never occured to me before, yet it immediately seemed to make sense. After this new information became known to me I had to watch this movie yet again, looking at all the clues i'd somehow missed. This was, to me at the time, one of the most brilliant things I'd ever seen in a movie, it was like a movie with a surprise ending where they leave out the surprise ending and you sort of have to figure it out yourself.

I then read the novel on which the movie was based : "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" by Philip K Dick. The novel is different in many ways, but they both somehow share a similar mood. Many of the elements of the novel are merely hinted at such as the synthetic animals, mars colonies, severe pollution and of course whether Deckard is human or replicant and his self doubt about this (by the way, I would have loved to have seen the police station scene which is in the novel on the screen, truly one of the most bizarre plot twists I have ever seen in a book or movie). Philip K Dick has since become one of my favorite authors and this is the only movie so far which truly captures the spirit of his work.

The basic theme of the movie is the question of what makes us human. In a society where technology is ever more present, man tries to make the machines(or in this case replicants) more and more human, and at the same time man becomes more machine, tracking down these human-like machines and "retiring" them without emotion. What makes the replicants less human than actual humans? According to the film and novel, it's their lack of empathy towards other living things. Yet humans feel no empathy towards the replicants and just as the replicants start to develop this empathy (towards each other at first, but eventually towards all living things) they die (replicants are designed to cease functionning after four years, around the time they start to develop emotions). When Roy Batty saves Deckard's life, he has become as human as anyone, as he recognises the value of life. What makes us human is that we care about others, not the fact that we are merely alive.

There are other philosophical, psychological and theological aspects to this film, but this is the one that affected me the most.

[Blackbelt Jones]

Originally Posted by lostwire

C'mon, I know there are more cats than myself who recognize this as one of the best film ever made.

First R rated movie I ever saw... my mom rented it for me from the Waterford (Wisconsin) Public Library. My mom made me cover my eyes when Zora disrobed.

The movie absolutly blew me away. It was literlly what made me get an apartment in downtown Chicago (I wanted to have "Deckard" moments on the balcony). I have been a city dweller ever since!

It was also the first movie (VHS) I ever bought (US and, later, European Version), the first movie I had a bootleg copy of (Criteron Lasedisc), AND the first DVD I ever bought. Hell, I still own the Marvel comics version!

[stiles]

I couldn't tell you about the birth of cyber-punk... but has anyone read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, by Heinlein? That's the first novel I can remember that has a computer with a personality...

I'm sure Moebius was a big influence on those guys, back in the day... but I think the majority of this film holds its look to one guy, Syd Mead. I'm lucky enough to own a few of his books, and the work is just incredible.

I find that the major differences between the book and the movie have more to do with morality than with anything else.

The script is a detective story, pure and simple, where the novel is a story about the decline of man and his attempt to find the moral ground he's lost... the Mercerism vs. Buster Friendly fight. Not to mention how the androids are trying to get their own rights by proving Mercerism false.

I think the movie uses the idea from the book, and that's about it. Not to knock the movie, I think it's perfect, but I don't think it's the most loyal of adaptations of Dick's work.

That would go to Total Recall, for me. It kept true to the paranoia of the character and his situation, even though Verhoeven made it hyper-violent, because that's his style.

[SephirothClone]

So it seems that there is a difference from the Director's Cut and Theatrical cut, huh? I may be in need to see the theatrical cut to see how different the movie really is. I imagine the lack of Dekards voice over kinda hurts the narraration?

[Dilmo]

Originally Posted by SephirothClone

I may be in need to see the theatrical cut to see how different the movie really is.

The theatrical cut isn't available on video, only the Director's Cut, and the European Cut on laserdisc and some rare vhs tapes. All it is is the European Cut with a little less violence.

I think this might be better suited in software.

[videoworx]

wow, my favourite movie in the entire universe, and this is the first time I've noticed this thread...

me -->

[Hardcore Legend]

I watched this for the first time tonight, simply because before it dropped to $5.50 at Wal*Mart, I refused to give Warner money for a substandard release.

Anyways, overall I thought the film was good. However, I was disappointed in the amount of story that was there. I wanted more interaction between characters. I wanted more back story. I wanted more clues as to what was happening. Christ, Scott pulled a fast one on all of us with the Deckard thing, basically because he gave us 2 clues that were so weak as far as clues go that if I was just some bump on the log in Tennessee I would have never figured this out.

For the first half of the film, I was like...why are you obsessed with everyone's eyes. Get over it. And then when he showed the scene with the owl, I was like "That's it, jagoff. 3 minutes dedicated to this owl's eyes is getting pretty lame" And then it hit me. The things that were glaring, sticking out at you as so 'out of the mold' so almost annoying at how they didn't belong were clues. Like the pictures in Deckard's apartment of women that had to have been taken 150 years before the film was supposed to take place. You begin to think either he is collecting them from replicants or he is one.

There are some things that don't make sense to me yet on the ending, I mean...Deckard's discovery. Plus, they open up alot more questions. Hopefully we can get an SE of this sometime soon so I can have the director explain it to me.

Anyways, other than that I thought it was great. As a noir, I loved the rain soaked, shadow filled scenes.

[Notoriousaurus]

Originally Posted by Hardcore Legend

Hopefully we can get an SE of this sometime soon...

Yeah, you know you want that.

Originally Posted by Hardcore Legend

so I can have the director explain it to me.

No, you don't want that.

[videoworx]

well, the eyes glowing = replicant is indeed obvious (in fact, Deckard's eyes glow as he comes out of the shadows behind rachel in one particular scene).
I don't think the addition of the unicorn dream really works (at that point, the premise is thrown in your face when gaff makes the origami unicorn at the end)...i prefer the mystery of the original cut, as it allows the audience to make up their own decision about Deckard's future. The only reason I really enjoy the "director's" cut is that the lack of narration really brings out the music (which is some of Vangelis' finest work, and works perfectly in every scene you hear it).

[Hardcore Legend]

I like the original idea of taking her out in the woods and blasting her in the back of skull.