« THE WARD | Main | BEATS RHYMES & LIFE: THE TRAVELS OF A TRIBE CALLED QUEST »

July 03, 2011

BLADE RUNNER — CLASSIC FILM PICK

Welcome!

Groupthink doesn't live here, critical thought does.ColeSmithey.comThis ad-free website is dedicated to Agnès Varda and to Luis Buñuel. Punk heart still beating.

Get cool rewards when you click on the button to pledge your support through Patreon.

Thanks a lot acorns!

Your kind generosity keeps the reviews coming!

ColeSmithey.com

 

 

ColeSmithey.comRidley Scott's 1982 adaptation of Philip K. Dick's "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" was marred by a ham-fisted narration track that ruined the overall effect of Scott's original vision due to editorial meddling from the production studio.

It wasn't until 1991 that a "director-approved" version was released that deleted Harrison Ford's monotone voiceover commentary.

ColeSmithey.com

Over the years, seven different versions of the film have been released. Ridley Scott's brilliant, digitally remastered, 25th anniversary "Final Cut" gets the last word as the representative version to judge it by.

ColeSmithey.com

Stylistically, "Blade Runner" is a baroque mélange of retro and futuristic industrial elements set in a dark and grungy atmosphere of permanent night. Scott employs a punk rock/new wave esthetic that is both glamorous and sexy.

ColeSmithey.com

The film incorporates a plethora of influences that include film noir, neo-noir, and cultural and political satire. The filmmaker establishes the human eye as an image system to convey layers of thematic subtext.

ColeSmithey.com

It's 2019 and Los Angeles is a dystopian nightmare. Fire and smoke billow from the tops of skyscrapers in a smog-covered city that looks more like Hong Kong than the City of Angels. Its trash-strewn streets are a literal melting pot where rising steam and smoke clouds your vision.

ColeSmithey.com

Impoverished citizens of every nationality and rebel bent bustle under constant rain. Corporate logos of '80s-era companies illuminate with artificial neon and digital light. Cars called "spinners" fly vertically and horizontally like helicopters amid the crammed urban conditions.

ColeSmithey.com

Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is a grizzled veteran "blade runner" — a career assassin of genetically engineered organic robots called replicants. Deckard dresses like an ironic transplant from a Dashiell Hammett novel. Here, Harrison Ford's squeaky-clean Star Wars character Han Solo turns into a cynical and corrupt anti-hero with a romantic side.

ColeSmithey.com

Manufactured by the Tyrell Corporation, replicants are humanoid slaves who work on "off-world" planet colonies inhabited by the very rich. Programmed for four-year life spans, these organic robots are forbidden by law to set foot on Earth. Hence, Deckard's dubious task to distinguish the lifelike androids from humans, and destroy them.

ColeSmithey.com

The arrival of five rogue replicants, led by Rutger Hauer's Aryan-looking character Ray Batty, sends Deckard on a search-and-destroy mission that brings into relief discrepancies between the conscious and subconscious mind of humans and replicants alike. Even Deckard might not be the free-will human being he imagines himself to be. The artificial reasoning abilities of advanced Nexus 6 replicant models might just be more humane than their human creators.

Rated R. 117 mins.

5 Stars“ColeSmithey.com“

Cozy Cole

Cole Smithey on Patreon

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

Verify your Comment

Previewing your Comment

This is only a preview. Your comment has not yet been posted.

Working...
Your comment could not be posted. Error type:
Your comment has been saved. Comments are moderated and will not appear until approved by the author. Post another comment

The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.

As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.

Having trouble reading this image? View an alternate.

Working...

Post a comment

Comments are moderated, and will not appear until the author has approved them.

Featured Video

SMART NEW MEDIA® Custom Videos

COLE SMITHEY’S MOVIE WEEK

COLE SMITHEY’S CLASSIC CINEMA

Throwback Thursday


Podcast Series