BSA 104 (Scriptwriting) Week 12 : Blade Runner The Director's Cut

Blade Runner is set in an alternate 2019 wherein other planets have been colonized and everyone who could leave Earth has. Only the poor, disabled or qualify for whatever other reason are left behind. The movie follows Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), an ex-cop with a bounty-hunter profession. He "retires" replicants (bioengineered androids used to do the dirty work offworld), before he can settle down and leave the service behind Rick must take out 4 last replicants who have made their way back to earth.

I think the response a lot of people have when watching Blade Runner is that of boredom, it's a very slow movie with a score that is tailor made for putting someone to sleep. I remember the first time I tried watching Blade Runner, I was 11 or 12 and knew that it was one of the all time classic sci-fi movies from the 80's. My enthusiasm soon died down when I started watching, I know I watched the whole thing but I must have nodded off multiple times because everything seemed like new information this time around. 

This time I actually really enjoyed myself, I found myself intrigued by the setup. The film opens with expositional text and a Turing test type scene, this is what got me hooked. I found myself very interested in the universe and how it worked, what a replicant is is never fully explained and the journey to find out whether or not they are really human seemed exciting. The main emotion as the film went on was disappointment. The way people treat the film and the way its presented built the expectation in me that it would be an interesting study into what is human and what is not. If anything I wanted more philosophical elements in Blade Runner, the movie touched upon its themes 

One of the biggest problems with Blade Runner, and the reason I think many people have a hard time engaging with it, is because of it's main character. Deckard is a man with very little personality, his motivations are unclear and he rarely does something to endear us to him.

The biggest change from the theatrical cut to the director's cut is the narration. The studios originally forced Ridley Scott to add narration to the film in order to make the events unfolding a bit more clear and to avoid confusion in the audience. Watching it without the narration I had no problem understanding what was going on, but narration could have been an effective tool to imbue Decker with some more personality. The protagonist we get is one that we know nothing about. He doesn't seem to have any goals or desires, his life seems empty without the job and yet he wants to quit and he doesn't have any discernible characteristics.  In short he's boring, the most interesting thing he does is put on an act to convince one of his targets that he's not a threat and this comes so late in the movie that it felt out of place.

When we discussed the film in class the main issue with Deckard as a protagonist was revealed to be his motivation. Like a lot of noir films Deckard is placed in a situation that he isn't comfortable with and he goes along unwillingly. In Blade Runner Deckard gets forced to do one last job by the police even though he makes it clear that he has no intention of continuing to be a Blade Runner. The problem is that the movie never established why he does what the police officer tells him, there is nothing at stake for him to follow the order he's given, yet he goes along with it anyway. As an audience member I didn't support him in his quest because he himself didn't want to or know why he was on it. It felt pointless.

The only thing that Deckard does to make us care for him as a person is when he helps apologises to the replicant woman Rachael. Albeit he says some nasty things in order to warrant an apology, but his display of sympathy definitely helps to make us as an audience to like him. This is the only incident that I can think of where Deckard is represented in a positive light, it's so bad that for most of the movie he does things that makes us actively root against him. The controversial rape scene for example. Usually a character like this is one that the writers make us admire. They are good at their job or proficient in another area that makes us like them, the problem is that Deckard isn't even that good at his job. He comes across cowardly as he only engages a replicant with his gun in hand.

The side characters do a better job of being likable, I can't think of one that I didn't like or enjoyed watching in some way or another. The best has to be Rutger Hauer's Roy Batty. Thinking back it feels like he was in the movie more than the protagonist. At the start of the film he's portrayed as a villain, one of the first acts we see him do is interrogate an innocent man, but as the movie progresses he becomes more and more defined and sympathetic.

There was never a point in the film that I didn't like him though, even as a bad guy he's fun to watch. I think having a good actor or performance, even in a bad role, is enough to make us like a character. It just so happens that here that character changes enough throughout the movie to make us genuinely sympathize with him.

To me the opening scene and interview with Rachael (two Voight-Kampf test scenes) were the most engaging parts of the film. I think this is because it's a naturally interesting situation and because this is where the movie gets closest to actually exploring the theme. I was intrigues by the mystery and wanted to find out more. The other best scene in the film is the finale and Rutger Hauer's monologue. It was engaging to me because it once again tackled the main theme of the film, something which I felt wasn't explored enough. I can see why Ridley Scott has returned to a similar theme in his latest two Alien movies, I can only imagine that he too feels there was a lot of missing potential in Blade Runner.

The moments that lost my interest were not as commonplace as I had expected. The beautiful visuals and haunting score managed to keep my attention even through the particularly slow scenes. the movie is slow and I quickly adapted to that fact, I am surprised by just how consistent it is in moving the narrative forward, but there was one scene in particular that dragged on for way too long. The image analyzing scene was one that really didn't need to dragged out to such a ridiculous degree. It's a simple plot point that should be communicated quickly, instead the director lingers, choosing to instead show off the cool technology.