September 2, 2026 • 35 mins
With Ridley Scott's The Dog Stars in theaters and our own Ridley Scott Draft (with Vulture's Roxana Hadadi) coming Friday, we're sharing this 2017 Sacred Cow review of Scott's sci-fi classic. Michael Phillips joined Adam and Josh.
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Speaker 1 (00:21):
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Speaker 2 (00:45):
What kind of a show are you guys putting on
here today?
Speaker 3 (00:48):
You're not interested in art? No.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Well, look, we're going to do this thing. We're going
to have a conversation.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
It is Archive Drop Wednesday. Ridley Scott has a new
movie coming out, Josh. The Dog stars in theaters. And
this is a post-apocalyptic tale with Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin,
Margaret Qualley. Sounds a little dystopian, whether it's dystopian or not.
We're thinking Ridley Scott. Why not dip into the archive
(01:17):
and pull out something from that filmmaker? And we've got
Blade Runner 2017. We did a Sacred Cow review of
that film. We also have coming up, and I know
we're both doing a little bit of homework, a Ridley
Scott draft.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
That's right.
Speaker 4 (01:35):
I don't want to divulge anything about our draft strategies,
but don't you think Blade Runner is a pretty obvious
number two pick in that draft?
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Probably. I'm assuming you're assuming alien goes first. I am.
Speaker 5 (01:50):
And, um, but Roxanne is a wild card.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
I know. I was just going to say, we are
going to have a guest with us, Roxanna Haddadi from vulture.
And what's fun about doing guests is we're not always
quite certain of what their particular taste is, especially when
it comes to a filmmaker's entire career. So yeah, depending
on where she lands in the order. And if she
has an idiosyncratic pick that could throw things for a loop,
(02:17):
I tend to think at least between the two of us, yeah,
Blade Runner, Alien 1 and 2. But we'll see what happens.
Speaker 5 (02:24):
We will.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
And from September 2017, here is our Sacred Cow review
of Blade Runner.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
They jumped the shuttle off-world, killed the crew and passengers.
They found the shuttle drifting off the coast two weeks ago, so.
Speaker 6 (02:36):
We know they're around.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Embarrassing.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
No, sir, not embarrassing, because no one's ever going to
find out they're down here. Because you're going to spot them,
and you're going to air them out.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I don't work here anymore. Give it to Holden. He's good.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
I did. He can breathe okay, as long as nobody
unplugs him.
Speaker 6 (02:56):
The film Blade Runner survives in several different versions, and point-by-point,
replicant-by-replicant comparisons between the eight cuts, most of which are
actually available today, they've fueled many a Comic-Con conversation today.
and countless film nerd arguments since the first version was
released to mainstream bafflement and disappointing box office figures back
(03:16):
in June 1982, when I was 21 years old. That
same day in June, John Carpenter's remake of The Thing
came out, too, and both those films have grown in
stature over the years. That's kind of an obvious point,
but it's true, and you can find plenty of fans
who would pick either The Thing or Blade Runner, very
different brands of science fiction, as their number one film
of that year, 1982, whether they were born then or not.
(03:40):
Blade Runner comes from the Philip K. Dick story, Do
Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? And even those who didn't
care much about the film version, directed by Ridley Scott,
they had to acknowledge the density and fascination of the
visual quality of the film, the production design, the effects,
and the overall atmosphere. This was Los Angeles in the
year 2019. Perpetual rain falling, miserable crowding, huge looming video
(04:05):
billboards that, well, actually did come to pass more or
less by 2017. more so than the flying cars. Blade
Runner Deckard, played by Harrison Ford, who may or may
not be a replicant himself, depending on the version of
the film you're watching, chases down four rogue replicants targeted
for elimination, but he meets a formidable match in Rutger
Hauer's uber-mensch of a lemon-haired god. So, when I saw
(04:27):
the film at 21, guys, you weren't even born yet,
I know, I came out wildly conflicted, but was very
eager to see it a second time very soon, to
really see it, see all of it, or at least
more of it. Two questions I have for you. One,
did Blade Runner flop back in 82 because George Lucas
had reoriented the mass audience's taste for retro futuristic science
(04:48):
fiction so radically five years earlier with Star Wars? And two,
is Blade Runner a movie for you today that was
simply ahead of its time and now seems very much
what Ridley Scott intended it to be, an L.A. story
with legs longer than Joanna Cassidy's? So I wanted to
end on that sleazy note.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Appreciate that. I think you're right why Blade Runner was
probably initially rejected. You put this side by side with
something like Star Wars and it's absolutely a different experience. Contemplative.
I was relieved, though, that it wasn't overbearing in that way.
My memory of it, having seen probably the original theatrical
release later in the 80s, I would have come across it,
(05:30):
is what I initially watched. And my memory was that
it was more ponderous more existential on the surface in
the way, oh, I don't know, Prometheus is now or
even Alien Covenant a little bit.
Speaker 5 (05:40):
Covering similar ground.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Yes, it is.
Speaker 6 (05:43):
You're actually promulgating the auteur theory.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Well, but I think that in comparison to those films
in particular, it wears those elements lightly. In comparison to
Star Wars, it wears them heavily. So that's probably a reason.
I really did enjoy it this time. For the record,
watched the final cut. looked amazing. The Blu-ray. I mean,
the first thing we need to say, and you touched
(06:05):
on it, Michael, is the visual aesthetic of this film.
This thing could have been made yesterday, especially if you're
watching it on a decent screen on Blu-ray. It just
holds up absolutely from the flying cars to the, here's
the world building detail that jumped out at me this time.
That's just a small thing, but you multiply this, you know,
(06:25):
50 times and you get a full world The handles
of the umbrellas, how they glow, fluorescent. And you add
enough of those and you get this parade of bobbing,
glowing sticks down the street. It's just something like that
in terms of prop design, production design that really fills
out this world. And I think that's why the movie
has been so influential and has lingered because it set
(06:50):
that vision for so many people.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
And I think also because it's the definitive sci-noir. I mean,
this is a merging of those two genres, science fiction
and film noir. I think, and maybe we can get
into this, that's absolutely the movie's strength in some ways.
But it's also, there are areas to this where if
you're holding it up as a film noir, it does
fall a teeny bit short for me. But absolutely love
(07:13):
this revisit. Spoiler, it makes my top five films of 1982.
Now the big question that's going to be harder for
me is, do I prefer this or Ridley Scott's Alien?
Because I think that's one we've... bandied about on the
show here, Adam, and have always said, well, it would
really take a revisit of Blade Runner to answer that.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Now we kind of have to, and I don't have
an answer right now. I don't either. Excellent films.
Speaker 6 (07:32):
I think you've hit on another reason why the mainstream
audience back in 82 was just sort of perplexed and
a little bit turned off by Blade Runner because they
had just, you know, the last thing they remember with
that and that brand name on it, Ridley Scott, was Alien,
which really, you know, grabbed people by the throat.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Much more pure genre. Absolutely. And, yeah, the Cy Noir.
Speaker 6 (07:53):
Handle, I like that. And really only Spielberg's Minority Report
would sort of compete maybe with more recent work in
that same genre.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
No, I want to echo a lot of what you
said there, Josh, including the stuff about its noir influence.
But first, the cinematography, Jordan Cronenweth, we'll talk about that
a little bit, the art direction. Yeah, the visual look
of the film is still incredibly stunning and fascinating. I'm
thinking of this too a little bit, not just in
the context of something like Star Wars, but we did
a while back here on the show, a 70s sci-fi marathon.
(08:22):
And we covered a lot of movies that were made
in the early part of that decade that are kind
of silly now, though I wouldn't say The Andromeda Strain
is necessarily silly. And I like that movie, but Maybe
something like Silent Running looks pretty quaint and cheesy from
the 2017 perspective. But some of the stuff made in
the mid to later part of that decade, too, Logan's Run,
(08:44):
they feel way more than five or six years apart.
They feel generations apart from a filmmaking standpoint. And it's
almost as if this future dystopia had really never existed
before Blade Runner. I feel like it has been the
influence for every film that has followed it. And one
of the things that really stood out to me was
the sense watching it that it's terrifying. It does feel
(09:07):
like a dystopia very much at times in terms of
the overcrowding. We are clued into the fact that if
you want to get away, and most people do, they
go off world, right? That these are kind of the nobodies.
And even the detective or the cop Bryant at one
point says that to him, if you're not a cop,
you're one.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
Of the little people.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
Well, this is a world full of little people of
leave behinds who really have So it's a scary place
at times and terrifying, but it's also just because of
the look of it, exciting and alluring and somehow inviting,
like you almost want to go and experience this version
of Los Angeles.
Speaker 6 (09:52):
A few years earlier, you can believe in what you're watching.
Because the film takes place at night and it's raining
and it's got the right texture and background, the kind
of effects that Scott was working with and his team,
they're pulled off. You don't see any of the usual
blues lines around. A little bit here and there, but
(10:13):
it just has a believability. Now, does it connect? Does
it satisfy on story terms? That's what, you know, back
in 82 audiences were kind of like, it's not an
untrackable plot. It's a very simple plot. It's simply, okay,
you know, one relatably, you know, kind of worn down
private eye type figure, you know, in this case a
(10:34):
Blade Runner, has to chase down one by one these targets,
these replicants. the film's got a very kind of vignette
structure and that's unusual, you know, especially coming off year
before you had the second Star Wars film, Empire Strikes Back,
you know, of course the main Star Wars film, 77,
you know, that kind of pacing for the time was
just pure Atari, right? You know, like fast and you
(10:57):
didn't get a sense of like even segments or big scenes.
It was just all one ride, right? Blade Runner, very different.
And I think Josh, even if you didn't experience it
as ponderous or, At the time, I think it was disorienting.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
And as far as the story beats go, you can
even sense in the final cut, which is Scott's preferred version,
that things are still being a bit patched together in
terms of Ford's identity, Deckard's identity, his relationship with the
Sean Young character. And even here, there's the one glimpse
(11:33):
of the unicorn, right? The one dream sequence.
Speaker 4 (11:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
You somewhat know how to fit that in if you
have familiarity with the lore about all these other versions,
but seeing that just on its own, it's a little,
it stands out. So you can tell that there are
pieces trying to be forced together here narratively, and I
think that does provide a little bit of a hiccup.
But again, it's more of a mood that this movie
is managing to evoke. It's that fatalism from film noir
(11:59):
that it really latches onto and makes us feel. Of course,
you have things like, we've mentioned the floating billboard that
has spotlights that are constantly streaming through all the windows,
and all the windows have Venetian blinds, right? In 2019,
Los Angeles. So you get this noir sense. You get
Harrison Ford, you know, I was a little disappointed him
(12:20):
being a hero of my youth from all these other films.
You know, Indiana Jones and Han Solo. Here he's just
a harder drinking. Indiana Jones, a little crabbier, otherwise tries
to float by on the same charisma. He's no Sam Spade,
in other words.
Speaker 5 (12:34):
He's so disaffected.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
He's fine, but you could tell he's working against that.
charm that he brought to those other parts purposefully. You
can see why he was drawn to this. I'm going
to make my anti-Star Wars in a way, but I
think that still makes for a somewhat less interesting character.
The movie, really for me, belongs to Rutger Hauer. And
this is where the fatalism comes in. This is where
(12:58):
this movie becomes about mortality. And the replicants just stand
in for us. They have this four-year lifespan and Roy
Batty The way he has a dreaminess, he's in wonder
at the world, even as he despises his corporate creators
who have given him this four-year lifespan. And the way
(13:18):
Howard balances... I.
Speaker 6 (13:19):
Should say that's how it works at the Trib, too.
It's just a four-year renewal.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
I was going to say, you've been renewed a few times.
A couple of times. Not yet retired, thank goodness. The
way Howard balances those two things, though, where there's this
poet inside him, inside this assassin... and he recognizes his mortality,
and the way that reflects on all of us gives
Blade Runner, despite any plot confusion, this heavy sort of
(13:47):
noir fatalism that I think sticks with you.
Speaker 6 (13:49):
Yeah, I might argue with you on that. I think that,
to me, that is where the eye-rolling I do experience,
and I know this is sacrilege for the Blade Runner fans,
and I am a fan. I mean, I saw it
twice back then, and I've certainly seen it twice or
three times since.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
But.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Tears and Rain doesn't work for you?
Speaker 6 (14:08):
Well, I, you know, I do enough of my own.
I don't need to, but I think other things about
that movie, you know, really do point to everything Ridley
Scott explored over and over with, you know, the alien
sort of world of the more recent films. He loves
this idea of, you know, life as it is lived
or imagined by non-human, you know, creations. And it's a
(14:30):
great theme, you know, and it gets right to the
kind of, You know, everything from, you know, there's a
lot of movies and novels right next door to this idea.
And I think it's the point of this movie. But
there is something a little dead about the Harrison Ford character.
He's reactive.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
He's sullen.
Speaker 6 (14:48):
There's no heroics. You know, all that and all this
Harrison Ford knew going in. He wasn't yet an interesting
enough actor to play two notes at once within that range.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Yeah, he's coasting on his charisma here a little bit.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
Remember when you were six? You and your brother snuck
into an empty building through a basement window. You were
going to play doctor. He showed you his. When it
got to be your turn, you chickened and ran.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Remember that?
Speaker 2 (15:18):
You ever tell anybody that? Your mother, Tyrell, anybody?
Speaker 4 (15:23):
I am a big fan of the villain performances here.
I would include actually even Pris, Daryl Hannah in.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
The mix here. That's a really good scene.
Speaker 4 (15:30):
I think William Sanderson is the actor who plays J.F. Sebastian,
who sees them. And when he sees Roy Batty come in,
he knows for sure, if he didn't know already, that
both of them are replicants. And he says, you're just
so perfect.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
And they are.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
There's something about them that instantly suggests that. But I'm
with you, Josh, in terms of loving them. the Howard
character and performance, and I love that he is this character.
He's built up as a bad guy. Bryant calls him
the worst, and he's a menacing figure, and we are
supposed to be afraid of him a little bit, I think,
but he gets scared, which we don't see a lot
(16:02):
from villains in these types of sci-fi movies. He gets emotional,
and I do think that end soliloquy is still, for me,
one of the most tragic and moving soliloquies in all
of cinema. This idea of that he's lamenting memories and
locations and visions that.
Speaker 5 (16:17):
Are completely made up.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
They are meaningless to any human being listening to what
he's describing. And yet the way he does it, the
fact that he is so poetic about it and so
evocative in his delivery, it makes it such a lament
that you feel the power of that.
Speaker 5 (16:32):
So I do love that performance.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
And look, what I responded to when I saw this
movie for the first time, and honestly, the last time,
it was back in college.
Speaker 5 (16:40):
It was over 20 years ago I saw this film.
Speaker 4 (16:42):
But that question, of course, that typical sort of cliche,
if you will, sci-fi question, what ultimately makes us human?
And of course, the movie suggests that beyond emotions, beyond
a capacity for imagination, maybe it is memories. And beyond memories,
it's this instinct for survival, the desire for survival. To live,
to go beyond your life expectancy, however you pull that off.
(17:04):
And so we get into that similar ground to some
of the Alien movies with Scott, where he loves the
idea of meeting your maker, confronting your maker, and asking
for more life or demanding more life, which is something
I think we would all probably do if we could.
It is a fundamentally human quest. One of the things
I missed, though, that really stuck out to me this
(17:25):
time watching it that fits in with all of this
is the end of the film, that showdown between Batty
and Deckard. I always saw as Batty just kind of
toying with Deckard, maybe ultimately having sympathy for him. He
spares him, of course, but toying with him, but just
kind of prolonging their confrontation that he is ultimately going
(17:45):
to take him down, whether he changes his mind or
not is something we can discuss. But I thought maybe, OK,
he has a cruel streak in him and he's going
to take it out on Deckard, who has killed his friends,
the other replicants. And then what I really tapped into
this time is the way Scott emphasizes Deckard's struggle to survive,
really keying in on the lengths he goes to in
(18:07):
order to survive, climbing through those holes, climbing up on
that bureau, whatever it is, going through the ceiling, going
out on that ledge, the way he's hanging on for
dear life, literally, and his fingers are about to fall.
And we are constantly seeing that from Batty's perspective, too.
I think in a lot of ways, It's a more
intense and shortened version of the entire struggle of Batty
(18:31):
and his replicants since they had their mutiny and escaped.
It's basically I think what he sees in him in
that moment is that same desire to live, that same
desire to survive that he himself feels. And so ultimately
then sees a certain kinship with him.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
And there's a vulnerability there, too. So this is what
Ford does have, and this is what he had from
the start. It's the same thing that Bruce Willis tapped
into that made him an iconic action hero was vulnerability.
This guy could get hurt. He wasn't like Stallone or
he wasn't like Schwarzenegger in this way. And we see
that in Ford's performance here. I think it works really well.
(19:07):
And I think what's so moving about that climactic showdown
is is that Batty just succumbs to his own exhaustion
and weariness and maybe realizes the futility of this human
emotion he's experiencing, revenge. Does that make him human, that
he now wants to pursue vengeance for Deckard killing the
other replicants? I don't know, maybe. And the speech itself
(19:30):
works for me because it's almost as if Batty had
been programmed for Shakespeare. It's that dramatically given, right? That's
why we remember it. It's very melodramatic. He's theatrical. He's theatrical.
He makes entrances. Underneath that, you can sense that there's
something also deeply felt about what he's saying that Hauer
is also bringing to the performance. And I think that's
(19:51):
where the connection is made, where then we start to realize, OK,
this whole movie is about our own mortality, whether we're
replicants or not. Maybe that's where it has a leg
up on, I can see what you're saying, Michael, alien behavior.
You could say Alien did this. Well, it's a totally different,
it's a different kind of thing. Right, but in terms
of the artificially intelligent figure, you could say, well, Alien
did this with one side character. you know in ash
(20:12):
everything that Blade Runner is doing alien did kind of
off to the side to a degree I see that
but I think there's something larger and more universal about
this sense of mortality that we're experiencing in Blade Runner
that we don't maybe get In the character of Ash.
Speaker 6 (20:27):
Now, does it matter to you guys, the key question
that everybody keeps coming back to is Deckard.
Speaker 5 (20:33):
So I want to talk about that for sure.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
I don't know if I'm ready to get there yet,
but I think we should close with that for sure.
I want to go back to something you both brought
up in terms of the narrative and how successful or
unsuccessful it is, because one of the co-screenwriters here, David Peoples,
I saw a comment from him where he said, I
think fairly recently, that if you're talking about Ridley Scott
and you have to choose visuals over narrative, and I'm
(20:54):
paraphrasing here, he says, you always go with visuals, but damn,
I wish it had a better narrative, people said. So
basically commenting on his own material that Scott envisioned on screen.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
This is, I think, a limitation of the film.
Speaker 5 (21:06):
So you guys touch on this a little bit.
Speaker 4 (21:07):
I wondered if there were any more specifics about what
specifically with the story didn't work. What I would single
out does go back to what you were talking about, Josh,
in terms of the Sean Young character. And I love
her performance. And of course, part of what I love
about her performance is the way Cronenweth lights her. And
the fact that every time she walks into a room
and the way she walks in and out of shadows,
you are just mesmerized by her. And it is down
(21:29):
to her movement itself is also fascinating. But, oh, that
sex scene.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Will you kiss me?
Speaker 1 (21:40):
I can't rely on you.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Say you kiss me.
Speaker 4 (21:48):
The ramifications of it, everything that would go with this
character Deckard, who we can talk about the replicant part
of this later, but a human we perceive him to be,
we believe he perceives himself to be, about to engage
in this act with a replicant. The movie takes no
time to really think about any of the consequences of
that whatsoever. And I think that the whole thing is
(22:11):
so bizarre that There is a noir inevitability from the
moment she walks in. She's a mall and they seem
to be drawn to each other in some way. I'll
give the movie that. But when it happens, it still
feels like the movie hasn't completely earned that relationship between them.
And I think you can even point to something like
the fact that she plays a major role in the
plot when she saves his life. pulling out a gun
(22:34):
randomly on the street and killing a replicant who's trying
to kill Harrison Ford. Where does that come from other
than it's serving a plot need?
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Right, right.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
I think that's absolutely true. And I also think here's
where the noir comparisons don't do the movie any favors
because a strength of all the classic film noirs is
the femme fatale. And Young, I wouldn't, you know, I
don't think it's that arresting of a performance, but I
think that's because of the script, Adam, not because of
anything Young is doing. Certainly she is lit in that way.
They set her up to be that femme fatale, but
(23:04):
they have not written her that way. The scene you
talked about, the sex scene, rape scene almost is how
it plays now. I mean, it's really disturbing when you
watch the scene through today's eyes, maybe that 1982 audiences
might not have. But I think it's also just troubling
because the character is never fully developed and it's a
(23:25):
crucial character, right? Rachel should be the linchpin between the
replicant world and the human world, and she's not given
enough narrative support.
Speaker 5 (23:33):
To make that work. I think she captures that otherworldliness.
Speaker 6 (23:36):
I would argue with, I think both those performances, it's
not that they were spring chickens. I mean, they had,
you know, they had done some work by then, Ford
and Young, but I think those performances are not quite
what they could be, even given that script. I think
I think craftier, wittier performers, not necessarily playing for laughs
(23:58):
or anything. God knows that film can only accommodate so
much levity at all. But I think craftier performers would
play that guessing game a little more about how human
or how replicant we really are in different degrees with
these two characters. But I think, again, I get the
sense of kind of one note hit hard. I don't
(24:20):
know if Ridley Scott's even really an actor's.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Director, frankly.
Speaker 6 (24:23):
And I think Young, you know, I think he could
get 100 actresses in Hollywood who probably would have pulled
it off more so than Young. Yeah, medium talent at best,
I think. Now, Ford, obviously, better than that on his
high end. He wasn't there yet with this. And I
think that's a limitation of the film. I think also
just the storytelling rhythm, even if it's a simple going
to do this, going to do this, going to do this,
(24:43):
and then I'm going to, you know, meet my Waterloo
maybe at the end. That's a very methodical, segmented... vignette-oriented
kind of structure. And I think that's probably why the screenwriter,
David Peeples, the co-writer, was a little frustrated because it just.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Is what it is.
Speaker 6 (24:59):
It's not much, you know. And you get all this setup.
And one of my favorite scenes is the one with
Joanna Cassidy as the snake handler, you know, in the window.
And then she's, you know, that's a performer who is
completely alive. I mean, she's a great actress anyway, and
I wish she had gotten the role she deserved, you know,
in her heyday. But that, you know, obviously that replicant's
life story is over five minutes later. after this sort of, like,
(25:22):
Baroque-ly sadistic series of, you know, running through the plate
glass windows, which is like, that was, even in the
history of plate glass being smashed on film, that was
a ton of plate glass.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
It was.
Speaker 6 (25:34):
And it's a bit, that's, to me, that moment is
kind of, it's perfect, it's a perfect, you know, emblem
of what Ridley Scott's up to. It's gorgeous, it's unsettling,
and it might be a tiny bit much. Yeah. And
that's Ridley Scott, you know, whether you love him or not.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
I have to say I did get really caught up
in that question of whether or not Deckard is a replicant.
And one of my questions to you guys is why
does it matter really? Why is it that some people
refuse at this point to accept it? What is it
about the film or those characters or us as movie
watchers that want to cling to some notion that he isn't?
But before we get there, let's go ahead and try
(26:13):
to answer the question. Because like I said, it is
something that I've been thinking about since I finished the film.
Speaker 5 (26:19):
Where do you guys come out?
Speaker 1 (26:20):
Well, I'd have to separate, what would you say if
you had just watched, say, the final cut? I mean,
is there enough there that we'd even be asking the question?
I think that one sequence of the unicorn is maybe
the biggest hint, especially after we've learned that memories have
been implanted. He seems confused at where that has come from.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
And that may be just enough for you to say, oh, okay,
in addition to the Rachel character, who has already been
someone who's deluded to think they're real. So maybe you
could surmise it, but honestly... just having watched the final cut,
I think it's just a tantalizing possibility.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
Well, I did want to scan to this scene before
I sat down here and I failed to do so
in the original theatrical cut, but I think there's one
other giveaway even before the unicorn. I think there are
some other hints and clues potentially along the way. And yes,
I only watched the final cut this time, but there
is a hint that Ridley Scott puts in there that
(27:14):
I assume is in the theatrical version originally, which is
a question, she openly brings it up, right? She raises
it to him in his apartment. She says, have you
taken the test? Are you sure you want to? So
it puts that in our minds, at least as viewers.
He doesn't hear it because he falls asleep. I think
there are some other things that you could cling to
if you were looking for the support. The way Bryant
(27:36):
refers to him as a one-man slaughterhouse, the fact that
he does seem to have such a non-life, almost like
a replicant might, and he seems almost like he was
programmed to do this job and do only that job.
And he doesn't have the sense of empathy. There's a
vulnerability and an emotion to someone like Roy Batty, but
he has no problem hurting anyone along the way to
get to what he ultimately wants. Deckard is very much
(27:59):
the same way. I was even thinking about some of
the dialogue where there is that line I reference where
Bryant says about Batty, there is a bad one.
Speaker 5 (28:07):
He's the worst.
Speaker 4 (28:08):
He says to Deckard later, aren't you the good one?
And it makes me think almost, I wonder if it's
playing with the idea, whether Batty knows something Or Ridley Scott, again,
is just sort of toying with us the idea that, well,
he's the he's the good replicant who's serving the people.
So anyway, that's there. There is a clue, I think,
in the photographs on his piano. Remember, we see that.
(28:30):
And we do learn earlier that the replicants, they they
love those photos. They cling to those. They're given to
they're given those as as memories of a supposed real past.
Speaker 5 (28:39):
So that's all there. And then we, of course, get
to the unicorn.
Speaker 4 (28:42):
And I want to talk about that and the origami
leave behind, Edward James Olmos, right, at the end of
the film. That would seem to be pretty strong evidence, right,
that this must be a case where he's a replicant
because it is referencing his daydream, as you said, the
unicorn earlier, which ties back to Rachel and the clip
(29:03):
we heard and Harrison Ford informing her, no, you're really
a replicant because that might have been Tyrell's nieces. Those
were implanted in you. And it's as if Gaff, the
Edward James Olmos character, is saying, I've read your file
just like you read hers. That was just an implant,
that unicorn. That's why he made a unicorn there. So
that would seem to clinch it, right? That he must
(29:24):
be a replicant or that Ridley Scott is absolutely trying
to say.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
That he is. But is the movie better for it?
Speaker 5 (29:29):
No, I don't know. So we'll get there.
Speaker 4 (29:31):
Let me just finish my spiel here on whether or
not he is. Because you can counter that and say
in the original version, we don't get the unicorn daydream, right?
we do get the origami figure at the end. And
all it conveys is nothing more than Gaff basically showing
I was there. I could have killed her and I didn't.
And that's how we all saw the first version of
(29:52):
this film. And that was enough.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Or I'm on your tail.
Speaker 5 (29:55):
Or that too.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
I certainly read it as he was here. He had
his chance to take her down. He's letting them get away.
Deckard seems to realize that. And he kind of reacts nonchalantly.
It's not as if Deckard reacts to that as if
he's been stunned by some existential realization that he's a replicant.
He sort of turns and with some urgency heads out
the door with her. So this is all leading to
the fact that I think the more emphatic giveaway is
(30:19):
that goldish red glow that only the replicants have in
their eyes. If you watch the whole film, only the
artificial figures have that glow in their eyes. And damn it,
Deckard has it in the scene back at the apartment
where he's standing right next to her, kind of behind her,
behind her shoulder. And she has it in her eyes
and he has it in her eyes. And why would
(30:40):
that be there?
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Adam, that's the look of love.
Speaker 5 (30:42):
I mean, it does beg the question, why do we
only see it that once?
Speaker 4 (30:46):
Hmm.
Speaker 5 (30:46):
In him. But why would he have that if he
wasn't artificial?
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Right. And it does come and go for her as well,
I believe.
Speaker 5 (30:51):
Yeah, it's not there all the time.
Speaker 6 (30:53):
Nobody questions whether or not Sean Young is a replicant
at all.
Speaker 5 (30:56):
They don't. You know it right away.
Speaker 6 (30:58):
Do you like my owl?
Speaker 1 (30:59):
I mean, that's not a human. That's not human. That's
not human banter.
Speaker 4 (31:02):
I guess I would at least say this, and we
should throw out there that Ridley Scott has been pretty
clear now recently in saying, Yeah, he's a replicant. I mean,
if you're not agreeing with that, you're kind of an idiot.
But I would argue that, OK, I think he's a replicant,
meaning Scott thinks that's the most satisfying interpretation. And he's
now basically made it impossible with this final cut for
(31:24):
us to think otherwise. But I do think it was
added after the fact post mythology rather than pre mythology.
I think it's as if Ridley Scott had decided, I
like the mythology of it better.
Speaker 5 (31:34):
I'm going to embrace it. But it wasn't necessarily there.
Speaker 4 (31:37):
I did hear Harrison Ford saying something, though, that it
was something Scott was talking to him about on the set,
and he constantly rejected it and would act against that.
So that counters my theory. Right, right.
Speaker 1 (31:48):
So for me, the best film would be, and this
speaks to your question, Michael, does it make it a
better film if he is or if he isn't? The
best film for me is the one where it is
that tantalizing possibility, where we're not being directed or hit
over the head with so many clues, maybe given hints,
maybe given suggestions. Yeah. And you leave the film wondering.
I mean, it's a little dispiriting that this movie has
(32:10):
gotten so gobbled up by such a controversy when it
leaves no room for wonder. No, not anymore. That's what
the best science fiction does. I will also say this.
Speaker 6 (32:23):
The best science fiction.
A lot of it anyway, it really doesn't give a
damn about how, if the narrative's working in conventional, satisfying terms.
You know, a movie like Terry Gilliam's Brazil is unthinkable
without Blade Runner, and it's got a very different sort
of retro-futuristic world building going on, but it's similarly amazing
(32:44):
to watch and to look at. And that's another one
that kind of tells a simple, maybe reductive narrative story
just enough to kind of hang Gilliam's preoccupations on. And
that's written by good people. And Tom Stoppard worked on
that script. And I mean, it's got a lot of,
but it doesn't, it's not a story film.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
It just isn't.
Speaker 6 (33:06):
And I think a lot of Metropolis, Fritz Lang's Metropolis back.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Which- Which if anything sets the tone for Blade Runner. Absolutely.
Speaker 6 (33:13):
Which influenced everything we're talking about, honestly. It's, you know,
that's a bunch of kind of adolescent hooey. I mean, frankly,
on a story level, I don't care.
Speaker 1 (33:23):
Right. You know, and that's, and.
Speaker 6 (33:26):
As much as I admire Blade Runner and have happily
kind of reentered its world and kind of puzzled through
these questions about being a replicant or no or whatever,
you know, just as much, I'm still the 21-year-old I
was struggling to kind of wonder, well, what would have
made it, what would have made it really haunt my
(33:47):
dreams as opposed to just kind of encouraged me to
seek out its visual rewards, which is a little different.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
The craft is unbelievable. I think bad is your answer.
I mean, that's a very haunting experience that we're thrust
in the middle of, and it's a non-human one, and
yet somehow the movie in that climax makes it completely
identifiable to me. I mean, that is what elevated this
for me on... The rewatch. I knew it would be
(34:18):
visually stunning. I was glad to see that the visuals
held up so well. But to recognize that it also
had this undercurrent of fatalism that did hit, that did land,
was probably one of the more rewarding aspects.
Speaker 6 (34:30):
Can we at least agree in closing that we wouldn't
mind a different composer?
Speaker 5 (34:37):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
The Vangelis score really dates it. I think they're... In
the sex scene scene.
Speaker 5 (34:44):
That's really brutal. The only point where it bothered me,
to be honest.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
I was going to say I found it to be
almost like this alongside the rain, this synthetic storm that
washed over the movie, especially when we were seeing any
cityscape or having any sort of this immersive. scene setting
in the world, I thought the score worked really well
to have this sort of electronic synth-heavy score. But then
(35:07):
you take those same musical techniques and put them in
a love scene that's already not working and it's disastrous.
Speaker 6 (35:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (35:16):
Reminder that you can join the FilmSpotting family at filmspottingfamily.com.
And don't forget to tune in this Friday to hear
our Ridley Scott draft with Roxanna Haddadi.
Speaker 5 (35:29):
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
This conversation can serve no purpose anymore.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Goodbye.
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Speaker 2 (00:45):
What kind of a show are you guys putting on
here today?
Speaker 3 (00:48):
You're not interested in art? No.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Well, look, we're going to do this thing. We're going
to have a conversation.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
It is Archive Drop Wednesday. Ridley Scott has a new
movie coming out, Josh. The Dog stars in theaters. And
this is a post-apocalyptic tale with Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin,
Margaret Qualley. Sounds a little dystopian, whether it's dystopian or not.
We're thinking Ridley Scott. Why not dip into the archive
(01:17):
and pull out something from that filmmaker? And we've got
Blade Runner 2017. We did a Sacred Cow review of
that film. We also have coming up, and I know
we're both doing a little bit of homework, a Ridley
Scott draft.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
That's right.
Speaker 4 (01:35):
I don't want to divulge anything about our draft strategies,
but don't you think Blade Runner is a pretty obvious
number two pick in that draft?
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Probably. I'm assuming you're assuming alien goes first. I am.
Speaker 5 (01:50):
And, um, but Roxanne is a wild card.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
I know. I was just going to say, we are
going to have a guest with us, Roxanna Haddadi from vulture.
And what's fun about doing guests is we're not always
quite certain of what their particular taste is, especially when
it comes to a filmmaker's entire career. So yeah, depending
on where she lands in the order. And if she
has an idiosyncratic pick that could throw things for a loop,
(02:17):
I tend to think at least between the two of us, yeah,
Blade Runner, Alien 1 and 2. But we'll see what happens.
Speaker 5 (02:24):
We will.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
And from September 2017, here is our Sacred Cow review
of Blade Runner.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
They jumped the shuttle off-world, killed the crew and passengers.
They found the shuttle drifting off the coast two weeks ago, so.
Speaker 6 (02:36):
We know they're around.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Embarrassing.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
No, sir, not embarrassing, because no one's ever going to
find out they're down here. Because you're going to spot them,
and you're going to air them out.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I don't work here anymore. Give it to Holden. He's good.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
I did. He can breathe okay, as long as nobody
unplugs him.
Speaker 6 (02:56):
The film Blade Runner survives in several different versions, and point-by-point,
replicant-by-replicant comparisons between the eight cuts, most of which are
actually available today, they've fueled many a Comic-Con conversation today.
and countless film nerd arguments since the first version was
released to mainstream bafflement and disappointing box office figures back
(03:16):
in June 1982, when I was 21 years old. That
same day in June, John Carpenter's remake of The Thing
came out, too, and both those films have grown in
stature over the years. That's kind of an obvious point,
but it's true, and you can find plenty of fans
who would pick either The Thing or Blade Runner, very
different brands of science fiction, as their number one film
of that year, 1982, whether they were born then or not.
(03:40):
Blade Runner comes from the Philip K. Dick story, Do
Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? And even those who didn't
care much about the film version, directed by Ridley Scott,
they had to acknowledge the density and fascination of the
visual quality of the film, the production design, the effects,
and the overall atmosphere. This was Los Angeles in the
year 2019. Perpetual rain falling, miserable crowding, huge looming video
(04:05):
billboards that, well, actually did come to pass more or
less by 2017. more so than the flying cars. Blade
Runner Deckard, played by Harrison Ford, who may or may
not be a replicant himself, depending on the version of
the film you're watching, chases down four rogue replicants targeted
for elimination, but he meets a formidable match in Rutger
Hauer's uber-mensch of a lemon-haired god. So, when I saw
(04:27):
the film at 21, guys, you weren't even born yet,
I know, I came out wildly conflicted, but was very
eager to see it a second time very soon, to
really see it, see all of it, or at least
more of it. Two questions I have for you. One,
did Blade Runner flop back in 82 because George Lucas
had reoriented the mass audience's taste for retro futuristic science
(04:48):
fiction so radically five years earlier with Star Wars? And two,
is Blade Runner a movie for you today that was
simply ahead of its time and now seems very much
what Ridley Scott intended it to be, an L.A. story
with legs longer than Joanna Cassidy's? So I wanted to
end on that sleazy note.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Appreciate that. I think you're right why Blade Runner was
probably initially rejected. You put this side by side with
something like Star Wars and it's absolutely a different experience. Contemplative.
I was relieved, though, that it wasn't overbearing in that way.
My memory of it, having seen probably the original theatrical
release later in the 80s, I would have come across it,
(05:30):
is what I initially watched. And my memory was that
it was more ponderous more existential on the surface in
the way, oh, I don't know, Prometheus is now or
even Alien Covenant a little bit.
Speaker 5 (05:40):
Covering similar ground.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Yes, it is.
Speaker 6 (05:43):
You're actually promulgating the auteur theory.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Well, but I think that in comparison to those films
in particular, it wears those elements lightly. In comparison to
Star Wars, it wears them heavily. So that's probably a reason.
I really did enjoy it this time. For the record,
watched the final cut. looked amazing. The Blu-ray. I mean,
the first thing we need to say, and you touched
(06:05):
on it, Michael, is the visual aesthetic of this film.
This thing could have been made yesterday, especially if you're
watching it on a decent screen on Blu-ray. It just
holds up absolutely from the flying cars to the, here's
the world building detail that jumped out at me this time.
That's just a small thing, but you multiply this, you know,
(06:25):
50 times and you get a full world The handles
of the umbrellas, how they glow, fluorescent. And you add
enough of those and you get this parade of bobbing,
glowing sticks down the street. It's just something like that
in terms of prop design, production design that really fills
out this world. And I think that's why the movie
has been so influential and has lingered because it set
(06:50):
that vision for so many people.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
And I think also because it's the definitive sci-noir. I mean,
this is a merging of those two genres, science fiction
and film noir. I think, and maybe we can get
into this, that's absolutely the movie's strength in some ways.
But it's also, there are areas to this where if
you're holding it up as a film noir, it does
fall a teeny bit short for me. But absolutely love
(07:13):
this revisit. Spoiler, it makes my top five films of 1982.
Now the big question that's going to be harder for
me is, do I prefer this or Ridley Scott's Alien?
Because I think that's one we've... bandied about on the
show here, Adam, and have always said, well, it would
really take a revisit of Blade Runner to answer that.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Now we kind of have to, and I don't have
an answer right now. I don't either. Excellent films.
Speaker 6 (07:32):
I think you've hit on another reason why the mainstream
audience back in 82 was just sort of perplexed and
a little bit turned off by Blade Runner because they
had just, you know, the last thing they remember with
that and that brand name on it, Ridley Scott, was Alien,
which really, you know, grabbed people by the throat.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Much more pure genre. Absolutely. And, yeah, the Cy Noir.
Speaker 6 (07:53):
Handle, I like that. And really only Spielberg's Minority Report
would sort of compete maybe with more recent work in
that same genre.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
No, I want to echo a lot of what you
said there, Josh, including the stuff about its noir influence.
But first, the cinematography, Jordan Cronenweth, we'll talk about that
a little bit, the art direction. Yeah, the visual look
of the film is still incredibly stunning and fascinating. I'm
thinking of this too a little bit, not just in
the context of something like Star Wars, but we did
a while back here on the show, a 70s sci-fi marathon.
(08:22):
And we covered a lot of movies that were made
in the early part of that decade that are kind
of silly now, though I wouldn't say The Andromeda Strain
is necessarily silly. And I like that movie, but Maybe
something like Silent Running looks pretty quaint and cheesy from
the 2017 perspective. But some of the stuff made in
the mid to later part of that decade, too, Logan's Run,
(08:44):
they feel way more than five or six years apart.
They feel generations apart from a filmmaking standpoint. And it's
almost as if this future dystopia had really never existed
before Blade Runner. I feel like it has been the
influence for every film that has followed it. And one
of the things that really stood out to me was
the sense watching it that it's terrifying. It does feel
(09:07):
like a dystopia very much at times in terms of
the overcrowding. We are clued into the fact that if
you want to get away, and most people do, they
go off world, right? That these are kind of the nobodies.
And even the detective or the cop Bryant at one
point says that to him, if you're not a cop,
you're one.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
Of the little people.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
Well, this is a world full of little people of
leave behinds who really have So it's a scary place
at times and terrifying, but it's also just because of
the look of it, exciting and alluring and somehow inviting,
like you almost want to go and experience this version
of Los Angeles.
Speaker 6 (09:52):
A few years earlier, you can believe in what you're watching.
Because the film takes place at night and it's raining
and it's got the right texture and background, the kind
of effects that Scott was working with and his team,
they're pulled off. You don't see any of the usual
blues lines around. A little bit here and there, but
(10:13):
it just has a believability. Now, does it connect? Does
it satisfy on story terms? That's what, you know, back
in 82 audiences were kind of like, it's not an
untrackable plot. It's a very simple plot. It's simply, okay,
you know, one relatably, you know, kind of worn down
private eye type figure, you know, in this case a
(10:34):
Blade Runner, has to chase down one by one these targets,
these replicants. the film's got a very kind of vignette
structure and that's unusual, you know, especially coming off year
before you had the second Star Wars film, Empire Strikes Back,
you know, of course the main Star Wars film, 77,
you know, that kind of pacing for the time was
just pure Atari, right? You know, like fast and you
(10:57):
didn't get a sense of like even segments or big scenes.
It was just all one ride, right? Blade Runner, very different.
And I think Josh, even if you didn't experience it
as ponderous or, At the time, I think it was disorienting.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
And as far as the story beats go, you can
even sense in the final cut, which is Scott's preferred version,
that things are still being a bit patched together in
terms of Ford's identity, Deckard's identity, his relationship with the
Sean Young character. And even here, there's the one glimpse
(11:33):
of the unicorn, right? The one dream sequence.
Speaker 4 (11:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
You somewhat know how to fit that in if you
have familiarity with the lore about all these other versions,
but seeing that just on its own, it's a little,
it stands out. So you can tell that there are
pieces trying to be forced together here narratively, and I
think that does provide a little bit of a hiccup.
But again, it's more of a mood that this movie
is managing to evoke. It's that fatalism from film noir
(11:59):
that it really latches onto and makes us feel. Of course,
you have things like, we've mentioned the floating billboard that
has spotlights that are constantly streaming through all the windows,
and all the windows have Venetian blinds, right? In 2019,
Los Angeles. So you get this noir sense. You get
Harrison Ford, you know, I was a little disappointed him
(12:20):
being a hero of my youth from all these other films.
You know, Indiana Jones and Han Solo. Here he's just
a harder drinking. Indiana Jones, a little crabbier, otherwise tries
to float by on the same charisma. He's no Sam Spade,
in other words.
Speaker 5 (12:34):
He's so disaffected.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
He's fine, but you could tell he's working against that.
charm that he brought to those other parts purposefully. You
can see why he was drawn to this. I'm going
to make my anti-Star Wars in a way, but I
think that still makes for a somewhat less interesting character.
The movie, really for me, belongs to Rutger Hauer. And
this is where the fatalism comes in. This is where
(12:58):
this movie becomes about mortality. And the replicants just stand
in for us. They have this four-year lifespan and Roy
Batty The way he has a dreaminess, he's in wonder
at the world, even as he despises his corporate creators
who have given him this four-year lifespan. And the way
(13:18):
Howard balances... I.
Speaker 6 (13:19):
Should say that's how it works at the Trib, too.
It's just a four-year renewal.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
I was going to say, you've been renewed a few times.
A couple of times. Not yet retired, thank goodness. The
way Howard balances those two things, though, where there's this
poet inside him, inside this assassin... and he recognizes his mortality,
and the way that reflects on all of us gives
Blade Runner, despite any plot confusion, this heavy sort of
(13:47):
noir fatalism that I think sticks with you.
Speaker 6 (13:49):
Yeah, I might argue with you on that. I think that,
to me, that is where the eye-rolling I do experience,
and I know this is sacrilege for the Blade Runner fans,
and I am a fan. I mean, I saw it
twice back then, and I've certainly seen it twice or
three times since.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
But.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Tears and Rain doesn't work for you?
Speaker 6 (14:08):
Well, I, you know, I do enough of my own.
I don't need to, but I think other things about
that movie, you know, really do point to everything Ridley
Scott explored over and over with, you know, the alien
sort of world of the more recent films. He loves
this idea of, you know, life as it is lived
or imagined by non-human, you know, creations. And it's a
(14:30):
great theme, you know, and it gets right to the
kind of, You know, everything from, you know, there's a
lot of movies and novels right next door to this idea.
And I think it's the point of this movie. But
there is something a little dead about the Harrison Ford character.
He's reactive.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
He's sullen.
Speaker 6 (14:48):
There's no heroics. You know, all that and all this
Harrison Ford knew going in. He wasn't yet an interesting
enough actor to play two notes at once within that range.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Yeah, he's coasting on his charisma here a little bit.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
Remember when you were six? You and your brother snuck
into an empty building through a basement window. You were
going to play doctor. He showed you his. When it
got to be your turn, you chickened and ran.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Remember that?
Speaker 2 (15:18):
You ever tell anybody that? Your mother, Tyrell, anybody?
Speaker 4 (15:23):
I am a big fan of the villain performances here.
I would include actually even Pris, Daryl Hannah in.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
The mix here. That's a really good scene.
Speaker 4 (15:30):
I think William Sanderson is the actor who plays J.F. Sebastian,
who sees them. And when he sees Roy Batty come in,
he knows for sure, if he didn't know already, that
both of them are replicants. And he says, you're just
so perfect.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
And they are.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
There's something about them that instantly suggests that. But I'm
with you, Josh, in terms of loving them. the Howard
character and performance, and I love that he is this character.
He's built up as a bad guy. Bryant calls him
the worst, and he's a menacing figure, and we are
supposed to be afraid of him a little bit, I think,
but he gets scared, which we don't see a lot
(16:02):
from villains in these types of sci-fi movies. He gets emotional,
and I do think that end soliloquy is still, for me,
one of the most tragic and moving soliloquies in all
of cinema. This idea of that he's lamenting memories and
locations and visions that.
Speaker 5 (16:17):
Are completely made up.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
They are meaningless to any human being listening to what
he's describing. And yet the way he does it, the
fact that he is so poetic about it and so
evocative in his delivery, it makes it such a lament
that you feel the power of that.
Speaker 5 (16:32):
So I do love that performance.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
And look, what I responded to when I saw this
movie for the first time, and honestly, the last time,
it was back in college.
Speaker 5 (16:40):
It was over 20 years ago I saw this film.
Speaker 4 (16:42):
But that question, of course, that typical sort of cliche,
if you will, sci-fi question, what ultimately makes us human?
And of course, the movie suggests that beyond emotions, beyond
a capacity for imagination, maybe it is memories. And beyond memories,
it's this instinct for survival, the desire for survival. To live,
to go beyond your life expectancy, however you pull that off.
(17:04):
And so we get into that similar ground to some
of the Alien movies with Scott, where he loves the
idea of meeting your maker, confronting your maker, and asking
for more life or demanding more life, which is something
I think we would all probably do if we could.
It is a fundamentally human quest. One of the things
I missed, though, that really stuck out to me this
(17:25):
time watching it that fits in with all of this
is the end of the film, that showdown between Batty
and Deckard. I always saw as Batty just kind of
toying with Deckard, maybe ultimately having sympathy for him. He
spares him, of course, but toying with him, but just
kind of prolonging their confrontation that he is ultimately going
(17:45):
to take him down, whether he changes his mind or
not is something we can discuss. But I thought maybe, OK,
he has a cruel streak in him and he's going
to take it out on Deckard, who has killed his friends,
the other replicants. And then what I really tapped into
this time is the way Scott emphasizes Deckard's struggle to survive,
really keying in on the lengths he goes to in
(18:07):
order to survive, climbing through those holes, climbing up on
that bureau, whatever it is, going through the ceiling, going
out on that ledge, the way he's hanging on for
dear life, literally, and his fingers are about to fall.
And we are constantly seeing that from Batty's perspective, too.
I think in a lot of ways, It's a more
intense and shortened version of the entire struggle of Batty
(18:31):
and his replicants since they had their mutiny and escaped.
It's basically I think what he sees in him in
that moment is that same desire to live, that same
desire to survive that he himself feels. And so ultimately
then sees a certain kinship with him.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
And there's a vulnerability there, too. So this is what
Ford does have, and this is what he had from
the start. It's the same thing that Bruce Willis tapped
into that made him an iconic action hero was vulnerability.
This guy could get hurt. He wasn't like Stallone or
he wasn't like Schwarzenegger in this way. And we see
that in Ford's performance here. I think it works really well.
(19:07):
And I think what's so moving about that climactic showdown
is is that Batty just succumbs to his own exhaustion
and weariness and maybe realizes the futility of this human
emotion he's experiencing, revenge. Does that make him human, that
he now wants to pursue vengeance for Deckard killing the
other replicants? I don't know, maybe. And the speech itself
(19:30):
works for me because it's almost as if Batty had
been programmed for Shakespeare. It's that dramatically given, right? That's
why we remember it. It's very melodramatic. He's theatrical. He's theatrical.
He makes entrances. Underneath that, you can sense that there's
something also deeply felt about what he's saying that Hauer
is also bringing to the performance. And I think that's
(19:51):
where the connection is made, where then we start to realize, OK,
this whole movie is about our own mortality, whether we're
replicants or not. Maybe that's where it has a leg
up on, I can see what you're saying, Michael, alien behavior.
You could say Alien did this. Well, it's a totally different,
it's a different kind of thing. Right, but in terms
of the artificially intelligent figure, you could say, well, Alien
did this with one side character. you know in ash
(20:12):
everything that Blade Runner is doing alien did kind of
off to the side to a degree I see that
but I think there's something larger and more universal about
this sense of mortality that we're experiencing in Blade Runner
that we don't maybe get In the character of Ash.
Speaker 6 (20:27):
Now, does it matter to you guys, the key question
that everybody keeps coming back to is Deckard.
Speaker 5 (20:33):
So I want to talk about that for sure.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
I don't know if I'm ready to get there yet,
but I think we should close with that for sure.
I want to go back to something you both brought
up in terms of the narrative and how successful or
unsuccessful it is, because one of the co-screenwriters here, David Peoples,
I saw a comment from him where he said, I
think fairly recently, that if you're talking about Ridley Scott
and you have to choose visuals over narrative, and I'm
(20:54):
paraphrasing here, he says, you always go with visuals, but damn,
I wish it had a better narrative, people said. So
basically commenting on his own material that Scott envisioned on screen.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
This is, I think, a limitation of the film.
Speaker 5 (21:06):
So you guys touch on this a little bit.
Speaker 4 (21:07):
I wondered if there were any more specifics about what
specifically with the story didn't work. What I would single
out does go back to what you were talking about, Josh,
in terms of the Sean Young character. And I love
her performance. And of course, part of what I love
about her performance is the way Cronenweth lights her. And
the fact that every time she walks into a room
and the way she walks in and out of shadows,
you are just mesmerized by her. And it is down
(21:29):
to her movement itself is also fascinating. But, oh, that
sex scene.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Will you kiss me?
Speaker 1 (21:40):
I can't rely on you.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Say you kiss me.
Speaker 4 (21:48):
The ramifications of it, everything that would go with this
character Deckard, who we can talk about the replicant part
of this later, but a human we perceive him to be,
we believe he perceives himself to be, about to engage
in this act with a replicant. The movie takes no
time to really think about any of the consequences of
that whatsoever. And I think that the whole thing is
(22:11):
so bizarre that There is a noir inevitability from the
moment she walks in. She's a mall and they seem
to be drawn to each other in some way. I'll
give the movie that. But when it happens, it still
feels like the movie hasn't completely earned that relationship between them.
And I think you can even point to something like
the fact that she plays a major role in the
plot when she saves his life. pulling out a gun
(22:34):
randomly on the street and killing a replicant who's trying
to kill Harrison Ford. Where does that come from other
than it's serving a plot need?
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Right, right.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
I think that's absolutely true. And I also think here's
where the noir comparisons don't do the movie any favors
because a strength of all the classic film noirs is
the femme fatale. And Young, I wouldn't, you know, I
don't think it's that arresting of a performance, but I
think that's because of the script, Adam, not because of
anything Young is doing. Certainly she is lit in that way.
They set her up to be that femme fatale, but
(23:04):
they have not written her that way. The scene you
talked about, the sex scene, rape scene almost is how
it plays now. I mean, it's really disturbing when you
watch the scene through today's eyes, maybe that 1982 audiences
might not have. But I think it's also just troubling
because the character is never fully developed and it's a
(23:25):
crucial character, right? Rachel should be the linchpin between the
replicant world and the human world, and she's not given
enough narrative support.
Speaker 5 (23:33):
To make that work. I think she captures that otherworldliness.
Speaker 6 (23:36):
I would argue with, I think both those performances, it's
not that they were spring chickens. I mean, they had,
you know, they had done some work by then, Ford
and Young, but I think those performances are not quite
what they could be, even given that script. I think
I think craftier, wittier performers, not necessarily playing for laughs
(23:58):
or anything. God knows that film can only accommodate so
much levity at all. But I think craftier performers would
play that guessing game a little more about how human
or how replicant we really are in different degrees with
these two characters. But I think, again, I get the
sense of kind of one note hit hard. I don't
(24:20):
know if Ridley Scott's even really an actor's.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Director, frankly.
Speaker 6 (24:23):
And I think Young, you know, I think he could
get 100 actresses in Hollywood who probably would have pulled
it off more so than Young. Yeah, medium talent at best,
I think. Now, Ford, obviously, better than that on his
high end. He wasn't there yet with this. And I
think that's a limitation of the film. I think also
just the storytelling rhythm, even if it's a simple going
to do this, going to do this, going to do this,
(24:43):
and then I'm going to, you know, meet my Waterloo
maybe at the end. That's a very methodical, segmented... vignette-oriented
kind of structure. And I think that's probably why the screenwriter,
David Peeples, the co-writer, was a little frustrated because it just.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Is what it is.
Speaker 6 (24:59):
It's not much, you know. And you get all this setup.
And one of my favorite scenes is the one with
Joanna Cassidy as the snake handler, you know, in the window.
And then she's, you know, that's a performer who is
completely alive. I mean, she's a great actress anyway, and
I wish she had gotten the role she deserved, you know,
in her heyday. But that, you know, obviously that replicant's
life story is over five minutes later. after this sort of, like,
(25:22):
Baroque-ly sadistic series of, you know, running through the plate
glass windows, which is like, that was, even in the
history of plate glass being smashed on film, that was
a ton of plate glass.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
It was.
Speaker 6 (25:34):
And it's a bit, that's, to me, that moment is
kind of, it's perfect, it's a perfect, you know, emblem
of what Ridley Scott's up to. It's gorgeous, it's unsettling,
and it might be a tiny bit much. Yeah. And
that's Ridley Scott, you know, whether you love him or not.
Speaker 4 (25:51):
I have to say I did get really caught up
in that question of whether or not Deckard is a replicant.
And one of my questions to you guys is why
does it matter really? Why is it that some people
refuse at this point to accept it? What is it
about the film or those characters or us as movie
watchers that want to cling to some notion that he isn't?
But before we get there, let's go ahead and try
(26:13):
to answer the question. Because like I said, it is
something that I've been thinking about since I finished the film.
Speaker 5 (26:19):
Where do you guys come out?
Speaker 1 (26:20):
Well, I'd have to separate, what would you say if
you had just watched, say, the final cut? I mean,
is there enough there that we'd even be asking the question?
I think that one sequence of the unicorn is maybe
the biggest hint, especially after we've learned that memories have
been implanted. He seems confused at where that has come from.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
And that may be just enough for you to say, oh, okay,
in addition to the Rachel character, who has already been
someone who's deluded to think they're real. So maybe you
could surmise it, but honestly... just having watched the final cut,
I think it's just a tantalizing possibility.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
Well, I did want to scan to this scene before
I sat down here and I failed to do so
in the original theatrical cut, but I think there's one
other giveaway even before the unicorn. I think there are
some other hints and clues potentially along the way. And yes,
I only watched the final cut this time, but there
is a hint that Ridley Scott puts in there that
(27:14):
I assume is in the theatrical version originally, which is
a question, she openly brings it up, right? She raises
it to him in his apartment. She says, have you
taken the test? Are you sure you want to? So
it puts that in our minds, at least as viewers.
He doesn't hear it because he falls asleep. I think
there are some other things that you could cling to
if you were looking for the support. The way Bryant
(27:36):
refers to him as a one-man slaughterhouse, the fact that
he does seem to have such a non-life, almost like
a replicant might, and he seems almost like he was
programmed to do this job and do only that job.
And he doesn't have the sense of empathy. There's a
vulnerability and an emotion to someone like Roy Batty, but
he has no problem hurting anyone along the way to
get to what he ultimately wants. Deckard is very much
(27:59):
the same way. I was even thinking about some of
the dialogue where there is that line I reference where
Bryant says about Batty, there is a bad one.
Speaker 5 (28:07):
He's the worst.
Speaker 4 (28:08):
He says to Deckard later, aren't you the good one?
And it makes me think almost, I wonder if it's
playing with the idea, whether Batty knows something Or Ridley Scott, again,
is just sort of toying with us the idea that, well,
he's the he's the good replicant who's serving the people.
So anyway, that's there. There is a clue, I think,
in the photographs on his piano. Remember, we see that.
(28:30):
And we do learn earlier that the replicants, they they
love those photos. They cling to those. They're given to
they're given those as as memories of a supposed real past.
Speaker 5 (28:39):
So that's all there. And then we, of course, get
to the unicorn.
Speaker 4 (28:42):
And I want to talk about that and the origami
leave behind, Edward James Olmos, right, at the end of
the film. That would seem to be pretty strong evidence, right,
that this must be a case where he's a replicant
because it is referencing his daydream, as you said, the
unicorn earlier, which ties back to Rachel and the clip
(29:03):
we heard and Harrison Ford informing her, no, you're really
a replicant because that might have been Tyrell's nieces. Those
were implanted in you. And it's as if Gaff, the
Edward James Olmos character, is saying, I've read your file
just like you read hers. That was just an implant,
that unicorn. That's why he made a unicorn there. So
that would seem to clinch it, right? That he must
(29:24):
be a replicant or that Ridley Scott is absolutely trying
to say.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
That he is. But is the movie better for it?
Speaker 5 (29:29):
No, I don't know. So we'll get there.
Speaker 4 (29:31):
Let me just finish my spiel here on whether or
not he is. Because you can counter that and say
in the original version, we don't get the unicorn daydream, right?
we do get the origami figure at the end. And
all it conveys is nothing more than Gaff basically showing
I was there. I could have killed her and I didn't.
And that's how we all saw the first version of
(29:52):
this film. And that was enough.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Or I'm on your tail.
Speaker 5 (29:55):
Or that too.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
I certainly read it as he was here. He had
his chance to take her down. He's letting them get away.
Deckard seems to realize that. And he kind of reacts nonchalantly.
It's not as if Deckard reacts to that as if
he's been stunned by some existential realization that he's a replicant.
He sort of turns and with some urgency heads out
the door with her. So this is all leading to
the fact that I think the more emphatic giveaway is
(30:19):
that goldish red glow that only the replicants have in
their eyes. If you watch the whole film, only the
artificial figures have that glow in their eyes. And damn it,
Deckard has it in the scene back at the apartment
where he's standing right next to her, kind of behind her,
behind her shoulder. And she has it in her eyes
and he has it in her eyes. And why would
(30:40):
that be there?
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Adam, that's the look of love.
Speaker 5 (30:42):
I mean, it does beg the question, why do we
only see it that once?
Speaker 4 (30:46):
Hmm.
Speaker 5 (30:46):
In him. But why would he have that if he
wasn't artificial?
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Right. And it does come and go for her as well,
I believe.
Speaker 5 (30:51):
Yeah, it's not there all the time.
Speaker 6 (30:53):
Nobody questions whether or not Sean Young is a replicant
at all.
Speaker 5 (30:56):
They don't. You know it right away.
Speaker 6 (30:58):
Do you like my owl?
Speaker 1 (30:59):
I mean, that's not a human. That's not human. That's
not human banter.
Speaker 4 (31:02):
I guess I would at least say this, and we
should throw out there that Ridley Scott has been pretty
clear now recently in saying, Yeah, he's a replicant. I mean,
if you're not agreeing with that, you're kind of an idiot.
But I would argue that, OK, I think he's a replicant,
meaning Scott thinks that's the most satisfying interpretation. And he's
now basically made it impossible with this final cut for
(31:24):
us to think otherwise. But I do think it was
added after the fact post mythology rather than pre mythology.
I think it's as if Ridley Scott had decided, I
like the mythology of it better.
Speaker 5 (31:34):
I'm going to embrace it. But it wasn't necessarily there.
Speaker 4 (31:37):
I did hear Harrison Ford saying something, though, that it
was something Scott was talking to him about on the set,
and he constantly rejected it and would act against that.
So that counters my theory. Right, right.
Speaker 1 (31:48):
So for me, the best film would be, and this
speaks to your question, Michael, does it make it a
better film if he is or if he isn't? The
best film for me is the one where it is
that tantalizing possibility, where we're not being directed or hit
over the head with so many clues, maybe given hints,
maybe given suggestions. Yeah. And you leave the film wondering.
I mean, it's a little dispiriting that this movie has
(32:10):
gotten so gobbled up by such a controversy when it
leaves no room for wonder. No, not anymore. That's what
the best science fiction does. I will also say this.
Speaker 6 (32:23):
The best science fiction.
A lot of it anyway, it really doesn't give a
damn about how, if the narrative's working in conventional, satisfying terms.
You know, a movie like Terry Gilliam's Brazil is unthinkable
without Blade Runner, and it's got a very different sort
of retro-futuristic world building going on, but it's similarly amazing
(32:44):
to watch and to look at. And that's another one
that kind of tells a simple, maybe reductive narrative story
just enough to kind of hang Gilliam's preoccupations on. And
that's written by good people. And Tom Stoppard worked on
that script. And I mean, it's got a lot of,
but it doesn't, it's not a story film.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
It just isn't.
Speaker 6 (33:06):
And I think a lot of Metropolis, Fritz Lang's Metropolis back.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Which- Which if anything sets the tone for Blade Runner. Absolutely.
Speaker 6 (33:13):
Which influenced everything we're talking about, honestly. It's, you know,
that's a bunch of kind of adolescent hooey. I mean, frankly,
on a story level, I don't care.
Speaker 1 (33:23):
Right. You know, and that's, and.
Speaker 6 (33:26):
As much as I admire Blade Runner and have happily
kind of reentered its world and kind of puzzled through
these questions about being a replicant or no or whatever,
you know, just as much, I'm still the 21-year-old I
was struggling to kind of wonder, well, what would have
made it, what would have made it really haunt my
(33:47):
dreams as opposed to just kind of encouraged me to
seek out its visual rewards, which is a little different.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
The craft is unbelievable. I think bad is your answer.
I mean, that's a very haunting experience that we're thrust
in the middle of, and it's a non-human one, and
yet somehow the movie in that climax makes it completely
identifiable to me. I mean, that is what elevated this
for me on... The rewatch. I knew it would be
(34:18):
visually stunning. I was glad to see that the visuals
held up so well. But to recognize that it also
had this undercurrent of fatalism that did hit, that did land,
was probably one of the more rewarding aspects.
Speaker 6 (34:30):
Can we at least agree in closing that we wouldn't
mind a different composer?
Speaker 5 (34:37):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
The Vangelis score really dates it. I think they're... In
the sex scene scene.
Speaker 5 (34:44):
That's really brutal. The only point where it bothered me,
to be honest.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
I was going to say I found it to be
almost like this alongside the rain, this synthetic storm that
washed over the movie, especially when we were seeing any
cityscape or having any sort of this immersive. scene setting
in the world, I thought the score worked really well
to have this sort of electronic synth-heavy score. But then
(35:07):
you take those same musical techniques and put them in
a love scene that's already not working and it's disastrous.
Speaker 6 (35:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (35:16):
Reminder that you can join the FilmSpotting family at filmspottingfamily.com.
And don't forget to tune in this Friday to hear
our Ridley Scott draft with Roxanna Haddadi.
Speaker 5 (35:29):
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
This conversation can serve no purpose anymore.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Goodbye.
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