Bladerunner (1997)

[Tau Zero]

Re: Bladerunner

I agree entirely. That was one of the things i liked most about the film. The fact that the replicants were more "alive" and "human" and had more "lust for life" than the real humans who were tired, jaded, and bored.

This doesn't make Deckard a replicant and, in fact, goes against this particular argument.

 

[steve12553]

Re: Bladerunner

I agree entirely. That was one of the things i liked most about the film. The fact that the replicants were more "alive" and "human" and had more "lust for life" than the real humans who were tired, jaded, and bored.

This doesn't make Deckard a replicant and, in fact, goes against this particular argument.

I really believe that the director of the movie left this ambiguous on purpose. We're supposed to feel that he might be a replicant rather than know he is one.

 

[Cobolt]

Re: Bladerunner

The unicorn dream sequence in the film may have some significance to him being a replicant.....

 

[Tau Zero]

Re: Bladerunner

The unicorn dream sequence in the film may have some significance to him being a replicant.....

You know, i've heard that, but i just don't see how. My own interpretation was that the unicorn was Rachel; unique and pure. When Deckard dreamed, he dreamed of a sybolic Rachel. When Deckard found the origami unicorn outside his door, it meant (to me) that Gaff had found Rachel, but wasn't going to kill her. Again, the unicorn is the symbol of Rachel.

But i don't see how it has anything to do with being a replicant.

 

[j d worthington]

Re: Bladerunner

Hmmm. For the longest time I would have agreed with you. Then, on viewing the film again a few years ago, something (I can't recall just what tiny detail) made me think this may have also been tied to his comment about "You've done a man's job"... and that Gaff was fully aware all along that Deckard was a replicant (set a thief to catch a thief, as it were), but for his own reasons chose to let them go ... perhaps he himself is one... It isn't stated, but it is a possibility to niggle at one; and fits very well with PKD's themes of confusion between who is and isn't "real", and the nature of reality, how it is defined, where the boundaries lie, etc.

 

[Paige Turner]

Re: Bladerunner

You know, i've heard that, (the unicorn dream) but i just don't see how.

I think the parallel is where Deckard proves to Rachel that she is a replicant by recounting a couple of her (implanted) childhood memories. Deckard dreams of the unicorn (and presumably doesn't tell anyone). Gaff makes an origami unicorn, indicating that he is aware of the implanted mental imagery.

As I said, I had all of this pointed out to me after I was convinced that Deckard was a replicant, anyway. This just seems more concrete than my photographs theory.

 

[Tau Zero]

Re: Bladerunner

I think the parallel is where Deckard proves to Rachel that she is a replicant by recounting a couple of her (implanted) childhood memories. Deckard dreams of the unicorn (and presumably doesn't tell anyone). Gaff makes an origami unicorn, indicating that he is aware of the implanted mental imagery.

OK, i can see the logic of that. But this is the problem i have. The "memory implant" is new technology as Tyrell tells Deckard about Rachel. If it's so new, how could Deckard already have it and be released (armed) into the general population where replicants aren't allowed? Why doesn't Deckard have the strength and invulnerability to extremes of heat and cold like the others? Why wouldn't Gaff kill them both? It's his job after all.

I don't know. A whole theory based on a dream and an origami figure seems, to me, like grasping at straws.

 

[ravenus]

Re: Bladerunner

I think it's one of those things that Scott came up with at the last moment. It's not IIRC a part of Dick's interpretation of Deckard.

 

[Paige Turner]

Re: Bladerunner

In the final analysis, the fact that people who saw (and loved) the movie can be having such a thoughtful discussion about Deckard's "status" so long after the fact is a good indication that the issue was handled perfectly. I think this conversation has moved Blade Runner from 5th to 2nd on my all-time list. Sorry, Driving Miss Daisy.

 

[star.torturer]

Re: Bladerunner

i watched both films, not realy but i decided that bladerunner (an all action boys film*sory for the steryotype it wasnt ment for here*) was beter, even if some guy murdered somone else in som ohter film

the titfield thundebolt is a beter film though, and so is the ladykillers and baron munchousen

 

[Paige Turner]

Re: Bladerunner

I just can't shake the feeling that you're trying to communicate. If there are thoughts behind all of this, I know many of us would like to know what they are. Do you think you could take the time to express one?

 

[star.torturer]

Re: Bladerunner

thoughts on what

bladerunner is a nice film to watch on a sunny afternoon when you should be outsied playing a sopring activitiy of some kind

ok im sory if thats not what you wanted but thats all i can say

becasuse as you say im rubish at posting anything of meaningfull value, so i will stop posting anything meaningless unless i say so

 

[C. Craig R. McNeil]

Re: Bladerunner

Semi OT. What did folks think of the short story "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" I didn't get it at all and Bladerunner can barely claim to be based on it!

 

[j d worthington]

Re: Bladerunner

Semi OT. What did folks think of the short story "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" I didn't get it at all and Bladerunner can barely claim to be based on it!

SHORT STORY???? This was a novel, (albeit a short one). Are you thinking of "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale", which was the purported basis of Total Recall? or perhaps "Impostor"?

 

[C. Craig R. McNeil]

Re: Bladerunner

SHORT STORY???? This was a novel, (albeit a short one). Are you thinking of "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale", which was the purported basis of Total Recall? or perhaps "Impostor"?

Short novel then. And I can asure you it was Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. I've read it and on the front it says "The story that went on to become Bladerunner." There's a clue there...

 

[j d worthington]

Re: Bladerunner

Short novel then. And I can asure you it was Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. I've read it and on the front it says "The story that went on to become Bladerunner." There's a clue there...

Okay. It was just the phrasing that threw me. I thought perhaps there had been a short story version I'd never heard of......

Shouldn't do that to us old folks; you never know what might happen. Especially when we're talking about memories and implants.... *shudders*

 

[Foxbat]

Re: Bladerunner

Semi OT. What did folks think of the short story "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" I didn't get it at all and Bladerunner can barely claim to be based on it!

Well, to answer your question from my point of view - I've always found PKD hard going...but what keeps me coming back to him is that there is usually something interesting lurking beneath the paranoia that seems to fill most of his works. I found the film and story quite different both aesthetically and plotwise but, deep down, they both carried that sense of loss in a world changing for the worse.....and in that sense, I felt the movie did the story justice.

I hope that makes more sense to you than it does to me

 

[Denie Alconn]

Re: Bladerunner

OOOhhh, I love that movie!!!
Rudger Hauer and Harrison Ford absolutely rule in this film, in my opinion it was way ahead of it`s time !!!

 

[Carolyn Hill]

Re: Bladerunner

C. Craig, I like the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? There are certainly differences between the book and the movie (such as the absence of Mercer in the move, the absence of Deckard's wife, and Isidore's reduced role), but I see the two as advancing essentially the same themes.

The movie and the book both stress the importance of empathy. Supposedly, the androids lack it, which is what distinguishes them from humans, but the book and the film undermine the distinction. In the book and in the film, we learn that androids / replicants can empathize and love one another. And in the book, as in the film, we see Deckard go from initial detachment to greater empathy. In both book and film, the line between android and human blurs. And in both, the audience's sympathies are engaged--our ability to empathize is expanded--as we feel for the androids. (In the movie, wondering whether Deckard is an replicant is part and parcel of that blurring and perfectly appropriate to that theme.)

Along with an exploration of empathy, the movie and the book both develop a companion theme that other posters have mentioned: the (lack of) difference between the real and the unreal. The book develops this theme more fully than the movie, examining not just "real" humans and "real" animals but "real" moods and "real" philosophies, blurring the line between the two.

And in both the film and the book, Deckard consorts with androids, questions his job, questions himself, and engages in a flurry of active killing.

One of the things I like very much about the book is the way that PK Dick plays with personification to reinforce his themes. In the very first paragraph, "A merry little surge of electricity" contasts with the "unmerry eyes" of Deckard's wife. The electricity has more liveliness--more life--than the humans, who are disengaged from one another and from their own feelings, needing to dial up their moods.

By the end of both film and movie, Deckard is calmer, more at peace with himself, and appreciates that "The electric things have their lives, too" (214).

 

[mikeo]

Re: Bladerunner

I am thoroughly relieved to see that I'm not the only one who really enjoyed the original version, and even prefers it over the Driector's Cut. Got to love the Harrison Ford narration.

As for the cutting down by 6 minutes - I never actually knew that.

It has actually been claimed that Harrison Ford did the narration as poorly as he felt he could (without being called on it), in the hopes that the narration would be dropped. I find it a bit silly - the director's cut has a better feel for me. Still, to each his own!

One of the things I find most telling about the film is that William Gibson saw it back when he was working up to his bridge trilogy, and he was distraught at the way someone had already perfectly captured the feel he was attempting to create in his writing.