I've seen Blade Runner many, many times, and it ranks among my Top 10 Movies of All Time list (number 6 I believe?). But always I have seen the director's cut, or more recently the final cut in theaters. I hadn't seen the theatrical cut, so I went out, picked up the 5 disc ultimatron mega blu-ray edition and set the date for Blade Runner.
Screening Date: 7/25/2009, 12:01 AM
Run Time: 117 minutes (1 hour, 57 minutes)
Director: Ridley Scott
Release Date: 1982
Attendance: Weird Dave, Patrick Griffin, Aaron Ostman, Eyo, Luke Price
Blade Runner is an awesome movie, with amazing visuals and powerful acting. Harrison Ford does an exceptional job as Deckard, a retired blade runner hired to hunt down and "retire" four replicants that escaped from an off-world colony. Replicants are man-made machine people, with emotions and desires, but with a built-in four year lifespan.
The four escaped replicants are led by Roy, played by Rutger Hauer, a Nexus 6 advanced model. The others include Priss, a pleasure model played by Daryl "Clan of the Cave Bear" Hannah; Zhora, a female replicant built for combat played by Joanna Cassidy; and Leon ... umm ... a basic replicant? I don't recall. But he did have one of my favorite movie lines of all time ("Wake up, it's time to die").
Anyway, Deckard tracks these replicants down through futuristic detective methods, which include and are limited to magic photo scanning/rotating/zooming devices. All the while he's interacting with Tyrell, a man-frog looking guy who runs the company that created the Nexus replicants. Tyrell's secretary is Rachael, played by Man-shoulders Magoo, also known as Sean Young. She's quite handsome.
Deckard figures out that Rachael is actually a replicant, though she doesn't know it, and they knock boots together. Deckard tracks down and kills Zhora in a crowded street, and then gets confronted by Leon, who is shot by Rachael. Two down, two to go.
Pris and Roy have shacked up with a genius man named Sebastian who has a hyperthalmic disorder, which means his body ages faster than normal, a parallel to the replicant's own condition. Eventually Deckard tracks the replicants to Sebastian's apartment and an awesome fight ensues, with Pris biting it early on and Roy essentially playing cat and mouse with the blade runner. There's a really cool, gross scene where Roy, his hand clenching in what we assume is a sign of the end of his four year life span, shoves a nail through his palm. Nothing symbolic there, no siree!
The theatrical cut of Blade Runner differs from the director's cut and final cut in two key areas. The first is the ending - the theatrical ending has Deckard and Rachael driving off on a sunny highway. Very uplifting, quite jarring.
The other difference is a voice over narration by Deckard. I like Harrison Ford, I think he's a good actor, but boy is he a bad narrator. I wonder if that's why he hasn't done any animated movies? The narration comes at odd times and doesn't add anything to the story, and in fact accentuates some confusing parts. Trust me on this one, you don't need to see the theatrical edition. Stick with the director's cut or future versions.
No comments:
Post a Comment