Posted on 06/25/2007 1:01:41 PM PDT by af_vet_rr
Twenty-five years ago, the Ridley Scott film Blade Runner became an instant science fiction classic. Set in a sodden, squalid Los Angeles of 2019, the neo-noir masterpiece influenced a generation of filmmakers and video-game designers. Long before I teamed up with Jamie Hyneman to form the MythBusters, I was a special-effects modelmaker, and Scott's cyberpunk gem almost instantly became the most important film in the canon of movies I love.
I'm still such a big Blade Runner fan that I watch it at least once every 18 months. I also own pretty convincing replicas of the "blade runner blaster" wielded by Harrison Ford's world-weary former cop Rick Deckard. The source material was a Steyr Mannlicher .222 target rifle magazine cover, with a Bulldog .44 carriage underneath. I can't get enough of this prop. Now, I want a working one.
In Blade Runner's dystopian near future, replicants, or genetically engineered humanoids, do the hard work on off-world colonies. After a bloody mutiny, the androids are forbidden from coming to Earth — on pain of death. So when six rogue replicants return home, they must be "retired" — hunted down and killed — and Ford's Deckard, once a top replicant hunter, or "blade runner," is pulled out of his own retirement to do the job.
I worked on Star Wars Episodes I and II, on the Matrix films, on AI and Terminator 3; yet 25 years later there are ways in which Blade Runner surpasses anything that's been done since. Watching the theatrical release DVD at home with PM reminded me of Scott's genius for creating stunning effects with simple technology.
(Excerpt) Read more at popularmechanics.com ...
I purchased the directors cut a few years ago... it has some scenes that make it a lot more clear that Deckard is a replicant himself.
Cool read.
Very cool.
Rrrowr.
Reportedly, this causes some contention between Ford and Scott. Scott says that Deckard was a replicant and Ford says no, he isn't.
I think that ambiguity is one of the reasons for the film's endurance.
Right.. in the directors cut there is a scene where Deckard is staring at the photos in his apartment and it is clear that he does not seem to know them.
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 Toyota FINE-S concept car |
“Does he dream of electric sheep?” that is the question to ask.
bump
Ridley Scott is also behind the CBS TV show “Numbers” and occasionally has his characters make references to BladeRunner.
Seriously.
I don't know, but from the article it's clear he can't "remember it for you wholesale."
That’s it, I figured it was just something that they machined or molded and threw a grip on it. I wonder what it’d be like to fire such a contraption..
I suspect that “Blade Runner” was the first theatrical release in which
the term “reverse transcriptase” was uttered.
Deckard — Blade Runner, B26354.
Yes, I have watched it waaay too many times.
How should I know, I just do eyes.
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