Friday, May 11, 2007

Fun Fact: in the book, the words 'Blade Runner' are never used.

A few days ago I finished reading Philip K. Dick's 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?' and liked it a lot, so I re-watched the film adaptation, Blade Runner (The Director's Cut).

What a film.
Golly gosh. The visuals are just incredible. It's the perfect marriage of the imagination and scope of sci-fi and the sinister stylisation of film noir, giving everything a gritty-yet-fantastical look. In every frame there's something to be impressed with, and as a vision of the future it's probably unparalleled. In fact, if we reach 2019 and it doesn't look EXACTLY like it does in that film, I'll be disappointed. I'll probably be more relieved, as it would mean that Earth isn't slowly dying under a cloud of post-WW3 dust, killing most living animals and forcing the majority of the population to migrate to Mars.
Still...how many films can you say look like this:
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or this:
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That's right: not enough.
And oh yeah, those images are from TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO. The Lord of The Rings has dated more than that.

Along with the visuals, the soundtrack (by Vangelis) is just fantastic. If anyone ever criticises 80s music again, play them the Blade Runner soundtrack and watch them quiver in wrong-ness.

You could claim it as an exercise in style over substance, but when the atmosphere is this powerful then the style is the substance.

Basically, if you ever liked The Fifth Element, Cowboy Bebop, Deus Ex, Akira, Batman, Brazil, Firefly, Samurai Jack, The Matrix, Max Payne, Minority Report or The Terminator... you owe it to Blade Runner.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Good words.