Blade Runner

One of my favorite directors is the great Ridley Scott. Many of his movies show incredible attention to detail and despite some having terrible screenplay's are very enjoyable. So in September I managed to watch one of his most critically acclaimed films, Blade Runner. To my shock I didn't enjoy it that much. All of the trailers and adds for it seemed to pitch it as this futuristic action film, but in reality Blade Runner was far from it. As I thought about it more I realised just how good of a movie it was. The film is set in a futurist world complete with planetary colonization and flying cars. In this new world overpopulation many animals have gone extinct, and genetic engineering creates replacements for lost species. In time genetic engineering was harnessed to create human like organic robots, known as replicants. These replicants are used off world for the most dangerous and dirty jobs. They are given a life span of only 4 years to prevent them from developing any "human feelings" such as love or hate. Ironically the company that makes them advertises with a motto of "more human than human" As a result of a replicant rebellion they are outlawed on Earth and hunted down and "retired" by blade runners. The film follows Deckard (Harrison Ford) retired blade runner who hunts down a group of brutal replicants that have escaped. The film plays out like a detective movie from decades ago to the point were certain cliches are used to further the plot and give a nod off to those films. Deckard soon cares for a woman named Rachel, who to her surprise is a replicant. The company has implanted memories of their CEO's niece to make her think she was a real human in order to control her better. As Deckard sits drunk looking at old photos the viewer begins to see hints at whether or not he is in the same position although it is never explicitly stated. As the film progresses we see that the antagonists led by Roy, merely seek to extend their lives. This gave me a realization that maybe the true antagonist in the film isn't the replicants but the humanity that created them and destroyed their own environment. The films imagery and effects are astounding, especially for 1982. Its acting is superb, surprisingly Rutger Hauer (the replicant Roy) gives a better performance than Ford. It is a movie that you can't watch out of boredom, because you really will have to think about it to get it. The pacing is very slow. The music is incredible, setting a tone of uneasiness and suspense, but it adds to the slowness. I only truly appreciated this film after it was over, and had a chance to think about it. After watching it again today I can say that my initial impressions of my first view are wrong, and it is in fact a great movie. I highly recommend it, but any viewer must know they have to give it a chance.