Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

‘Blade Runner’ at 40

esquire.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

321–330 of 435 posts

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#321

Post by [deleted] »

fullshark wrote: post #196
rainworld wrote: post #158

As for The Question, I believe there is a fairly unambiguous answer... http://www.gavinrothery.com/my-blog/2011/10/1/a-matter-of-el...

When I first got really into Blade Runner, having first seen the original director's cut, I enjoyed the question as a puzzle to be solved. Really got into fan theories online and the unicorn dream was the smoking gun, and wasn't that so clever! So cool. Then I read a compelling essay online (that I can no longer find) that pointed out the entire film's thematic weight only exists if the opposite holds. I also saw the…

[deleted]

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#322

Post by kirevmaco »

Jaruzel wrote: post #309
croes wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which cut?

I tend to recommend to people who've not seen it, to watch the Theatrical Cut first. Then watch The Final Cut, and keeping watching The Final Cut, and never re-watch the Theatrical. The Theatrical Cut obviously adds the narration, which for first-timers helps with the comprehension. However once you know the story. The Final Cut is just pure bliss and I never tire of it.

The Final Cut of the movie ruins the original look of the film. I'm amazed more people haven't commented on this. For example, compare the shot of the outside of Chew's lab:

Theatrical and Director's Cut versions: http://www.metabunker.dk/wp-content/uploads/br_dc_chew.jpg

Final Cut version: http://www.metabunker.dk/wp-content/uploads/br_fc_chew.jpg

See [1] and [2] for more.

[1] http://www.metabunker.dk/?p=1220

[2] http://www.metabunker.dk/?p=1258

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#323

Post by pram »

walrus01 wrote: post #165
nico wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is also the failed attempt of Jodorowsky to make a Dune movie: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky's_Dune https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_(novel)#Early_stalled_a... The documentary is pretty fascinating. Jodorowsky managed to put together a stellar team, among them H.R. Giger, Dalí and the script writer who would later write Alien.

> Jodorowsky I recently got a copy of this and could only come to the conclusion that they were doing a lot of drugs in the 1970s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holy_Mountain_(1973_film)

Holy Mountain is hilarious. I always think about the scene where the President's advisor says they need to kill millions of people to save the economy lol

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#324

Post by exodust »

cowmix wrote: post #110
jmyeet wrote: post #9

I am one of the 11 people on Earth that hates coffee. "Hate" isn't strong enough. Even "despises" I'm not sure goes far enough. It tastes disgusting to me. I can't even stand the smell. This has led me at times to wonder if I'm crazy or if everyone else is. I do notice a ton of people consume a ton of sugar in their coffee so it seems like many don't really like coffee. They like sugar. But I digresss. I have the sam…

The only reason I give people like you a pass on hating on Blade Runner is I, personally, can't stand The Matrix -- which has made me a pariah with my peer group for over 20 years now.

I liked Blade Runner, but one thing that bothered me was the lack of flat screen technology. All the screens are CRT, even the ones in the vehicles. You'd think the artists in the 80's would have easily imagined flat screens would exist in the near future. Chroma keying a flat square should have been a trivial effect.

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#325

Post by ivolimmen »

deltaonefour wrote: post #95
duxup wrote: post #19

I hated that movie the first to I saw it. I was bored with it. Now I love it. I really enjoy how much time they spend establishing the atmosphere and characters. It all feels very real and has depth. I loath the speedy sci fi that tries to touch on atmosphere and then hurries along with their paper characters and so on. So much sci fi I encounter now feels little more than a long trailer with no idea how to end.

There are three things that are important to the movie. - Pacing so you don't get bored. - Thematic depth - Atmosphere A lot of pretentious people like to ignore pacing as if their brains are made up of pure IQ and anything related excitement is beneath them. Make no mistake, we are all human and we all get bored. Pacing is important and it takes a lot of effort (and intelligence) for a director to maintain that leve…

Ultra slow? Have you seen "2001: A Space Odyssey"?

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#326

Post by exodust »

kennywinker wrote: post #129
jmyeet wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, you shouldn't discount the movie because it's intertwined anti-Japense sentiment of the time. It's simply more context. You cannot separate art from the time when it was created. It's why you see a lot of countercultural themes in 1960s movies, for example.

Listen, if I've managed to get this far without discounting the movie despite the blatant and jarring non-consensual sex scene presented as a love scene, I'm not about to let some mild xenophobia stop me. Some of my favorite pieces of art are deeply flawed. What's important is understanding what ideas they contain, so you don't just uncritically and subconsciously believe those ideas. The xenophobia in cyberpunk idea…

> non-consensual sex scene

In Blade Runner? I don't recall that... don't they kiss, and then it cuts to next scene. They still have their clothes on, standing by the door!

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#327

Post by kennywinker »

deltaonefour wrote: post #279
LegitShady wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Somewhere, someone is rolling their eyes because they are saying my entire argument for proving that Star Wars is science fiction is based on the fact that populism changed the definition of science fiction because of Star Wars. And to that eye-roller, I'd like to just say: That's exactly what I'm saying. Ya, but he's wrong. It's like a library putting a fiction book in the non fiction, and because its popular, rede…

>That's not an argument, that's a conclusion without any supporting arguments. Dismissed as nonsense as easily as posited without effort. This is HN not nature. It's not a scientific debtate, just a general conversation so the level of proof is not super high. You just have to trust me that I'm born in China, and Fantasy is not Wuxia. Just like you would have to trust a black person when he says he's not white. Don't…

I’m going to jump in here because I started this fight (tho i’d never heard the term wuxia before so maybe I’m unqualified) - but here we go - from the wikipedia definition of fantasy:

> Fantasy is distinguished from the genres of science fiction and horror by the respective absence of scientific or macabre themes, although these genres overlap

So perhaps I was overly dismissive. Narratively, it seems to me that star wars shares more in common with fantasy stories than sci-fi (chosen one, magic, battle between good and evil, sword that is your birthright, etc), but the setting is a sci-fi one (interplanetary war, clones, androids, space fleets). As wikipedia say “these genres overlap”.

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#328

Post by kennywinker »

deltaonefour wrote: post #146
kennywinker wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Starship Troopers, don't forget Starship Troopers.

Starship troopers was a masterpiece. Don't mock it.

I wasn’t! I promise you I was 100% serious, it’s one of my fav sci-fi movies… somewhere a few steps down the list from blade runner

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#329

Post by russellbeattie »

Just want to say for the record that I prefer the versions where Harrison Ford is narrating in his Sam Spade style voice over. It was the first version I saw in the 80s and I just like the nostalgia of it. Plus, when I first saw it, I was too young to realize how cliche it was, so it had the intended effect of "being inside the mind of a hard nosed investigator", and explaining the bewildering plot of course. But for me it was the feel of the narration that I liked.

Re: ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

#330

Post by jl6 »

majormajor wrote: post #268
aresant wrote: post #23

The visual language Bladerunner invented has virtually defined SciFi for the past 40 years. If you enjoy it's worth digging into the work Syd Mead - the film's concept artist - created: https://www.flickr.com/photos/x-ray_delta_one/5642443624/in/... https://www.flickr.com/photos/x-ray_delta_one/5642443252/in/... https://www.flickr.com/photos/x-ray_delta_one/5641873923/in/... https://www.flickr.com/photos/x-ray_delta_…

Even without leaving Scott, Alien seems to have been at least as visually influential as Blade Runner. Plus of course Star Wars and Star Trek... Blade Runner is fairly distinctive even today (outside of Cyberpunk, most other post-82 sci fi that I can think of is definitely more influenced by other things) which IMO is a sign that it isn't as universally influential as other 70s/80s sci-fi films. Off the top of my hea…

I don’t wish to detract from your point, which is a good one, but I do think Babylon 5 had some dark neon orientalism going on.
Post reply on HN