1982’s “Blade Runner: The Final Cut”, directed by Ridley
Scott.
Starring Harrison Ford, Sean Young, Rutger Hauer, Daryl
Hannah, Brion James, Joanna Cassidy, Edward James Olmos, and Joe Turkel.
Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects (Douglas Trumbull, Richard Yuricich, and David Dryer) and Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (Lawrence G. Paull, David L. Snyder, and Linda DeScenna).
What is it about?
“Blade Runner” is a science fiction noir, set in the year
2019 in a neon soaked and crowded Los Angeles where it rains constantly. For
the purposes of slavery, androids have been created by the Tyrell Corporation,
and are called replicants. The replicants begin revolting against their human
masters, and in response are deemed illegal. Detectives are hired to kill (“retire”)
the replicants on sight, and for this purpose are called Blade Runners. We meet
Harrison Ford, who’s job is to hunt down a quartet of Replicants, lead by a
charismatic Rutger Hauer. Daryl Hannah, Brion James, and Joanna Cassidy all
prove difficult targets, and Ford has to locate and retire them while making
eyes at Tyrell Corporation’s assistant Sean Young. Will Ford be able to finish
his task, or will he end up like tears in the rain?
Why is it worth seeing?
Released to mixed critical reception and middling box office
in 1982 (and almost zero Academy Award love), Blade Runner has since come to be
regarded as something like the second most popular sci fi film since Star Wars.
To know it was released the same weekend as, John Carpenter’s “The Thing”, is pretty
mind blowing, but either way is a genre cult phenomenon worth celebrating.
Fresh off of his 1979 hit, “Alien”, director Ridley Scott followed up his space horror
masterpiece with another classic, this one an update on the classic noir theme
of the Philip Marlowe gumshoe doing detective work amidst murky individuals.
Here, the people become generic extras, mulling about the crowded streets of
the now South Eastern Asian dominated Los Angeles, while aerial cars descend
from towering sky scrapers above, and the murkiness is the overall ambience of
the city.
There are 2 voluminous, unforgettable characters here: the
movie’s dense layers of atmosphere, giving us the copious smoke and fog,
constant rain, and spotlight and neon saturated streets and interiors
throughout the matte painting and model dominated fully realized world.
The other character is the music. Famed New Age composer Vangelis, using the now renowned Yamaha CS-80 synthesizer, reverbed through the Lexicon 224-X, give “Blade Runner” it’s ethereal, far away, dream-like feeling. And it’s with these 2 characters that Ridley Scott’s understanding of space and perspective, and 1 hell of a talented effects team, create the collage that gives Blade Runner it’s unforgettable texture and feeling.
The other character is the music. Famed New Age composer Vangelis, using the now renowned Yamaha CS-80 synthesizer, reverbed through the Lexicon 224-X, give “Blade Runner” it’s ethereal, far away, dream-like feeling. And it’s with these 2 characters that Ridley Scott’s understanding of space and perspective, and 1 hell of a talented effects team, create the collage that gives Blade Runner it’s unforgettable texture and feeling.
What is forgettable, in the foreground, are the characters
of Blade Runner. While Hauer’s depiction of the Replicant leader is a show
stopper, there are plenty of questions about whom these characters are. Hiding
behind all of the atmospherics and score lie people and a narrative so obtuse
it’s impossible to see through them (one literal example is a car ride where
the conversation is purposefully muted). With questions abound about whether or
not Ford’s character is a Replicant himself, the whole movie’s uneasy alliance
with the nature of reality vs artificiality, punctuated by occasional violence,
calls into question if in the wrong frame of mind, that only an android could
enjoy this gorgeously vapid caper.
There’s also a scene that can only be described as outright sexual assault,
that the movie treats as a love passage. It’s difficult to swallow, even if it
was 1982 when the movie was released. When did saying no when you weren’t
attracted to your aggressor come into fashion again? I’m hoping it was before the
Reagan administration…
Even with all of it’s above listed faults (plus: is Deckard
a decent detective? Has Harrison Ford ever convincingly done another accent? Why does that Replicant think
gymnastics are a valid fighting tool?), Blade Runner is a magnificent
achievement, with one of the greatest opening sequences of all time. As long as
you’re watching this version (and not the other 7 that have disowned by Scott
and/or Ford), it’s ambiguous ending and imitated but never copied art house
feeling is the stuff memories are made of.
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