There are two films in the history of human science fiction films that are recognized as the highest status films, one is "2001: A Space Odyssey" and the other is "Blade Runner". The two great science fiction films have a lot in common, both are novel adaptations, both are extremely slow plot rhythms, both are about the imagination of the future, and so on.
Classics take time to savor.
Just like "Blade Runner" was badly criticized when it was first released, it was only decades later that it was understood by the world. Even now, when most people watch it for the first time, they don't understand why this movie can be called a god work; you can't see some clues until you watch some film reviews and watch it again; until you have more life experience, look at it again, and see the last replicant boss say those few lines, only sigh, God!
But the classics are not perfect either.
Blade Runner does have a lot of grooves, and it's possible that director Ridley Scott didn't deliberately cater to the audience like most directors do now, and the film's viewing aspect is indeed lacking.
Slow pace Watching requires patience
Plot procrastination is the most criticized point of "Blade Runner", the whole movie is almost a few dialogue, the first 30 minutes of the two "human nature test" scenes, if you do not seriously look at the dialogue will affect the understanding of the plot later, because the "human nature test" is a very important part of "Blade Runner".
It wasn't until the leader of the Great Demon King Replicants appeared and wanted to get a longer lifespan that the plot had some look. In fact, the contradiction and conflict of "Blade Runner" is because the 4 replicants are doing evil on the earth, and the protagonist's duty is to hunt them down, but the movie is an hour later, and the protagonist finds the first replicant. Then there was finally a fight scene, but if it was to be seen as an action movie, it would definitely be disappointed.
The male protagonist has no aura, combat power scum
Seeing the title of the film "Blade Runner", this can't help but make people imagine that the protagonist is a handsome, omnipotent, super combat effective, halo plus Blade Runner. It's just that the decadence of the male protagonist Deckard played by Harrison Ford hides his original handsomeness, and the fighting power of being beaten by replicants makes people wonder how he can become a blade runner.
But in fact, there is a reason for this setting, if he is not decadent, it can not cause reflection.
The decadence of the male protagonist is only part of the decadent sense of the whole movie, sacrificing the aura of the male protagonist, but achieving and laying the foundation for another classic - cyberpunk.
This is the classic element of Blade Runner's greatest influence on later generations, and later another classic animation "Ghost in the Shell" in the future city also refers to the cyberpunk style setting of Blade Runner.
By now, nearly half of the sci-fi movie scenes about the future city have you can see the shadow of Blade Runner, including "The Matrix", "Total Memories", "Terminator", "Virtual Revolution" and so on. Even many sci-fi games are directly copied from the art design of blade runner's futuristic city.
Stills from The Matrix
Stills from Total Memories
Virtual Revolution poster
Of course, cyberpunk is not only a futuristic urban scene and utopian world setting that combines a shabby and dirty and futuristic sense of technology, but also often has various metaphors for real society.
The background setting of "Blade Runner" has the dystopian and pessimistic color of cyberpunk literature, be sure to pay attention to the background introduction subtitles of the story at the beginning of the film, and the simple 6 paragraphs describe a fictional world.
Early 21st Century, Terry Corporation, New Stages of Robotics, Replicants, Chain Six Replicants, Genetic Engineers, Xanadu Colonies, Bloody Mutiny, Blade Runner Troop. After remembering this series of key words, the plot becomes easy to understand.
It's like the "human test" at the beginning, which corresponds to the opening subtitle of "becoming a creature that is essentially identical to a human being." That is to say, in the world of Blade Runner in 2019, replicants are difficult to distinguish between humans and humans, and humans can only distinguish whether the interrogated object is a replicant by repeatedly asking at least 20 questions and observing physiological activities such as blushing reactions, heartbeat rate, and eye movements.
Distinguishing whether a replicant is a human or a replicant, or whether a replicant is a human or not, is the core proposition of Blade Runner, which also corresponds to the title of the original novel, "Will a Bionic Man Dream of an Electronic Sheep?" So the "human test" is a very important part of this movie. The ultimate discussion of the nature of life derived from this proposition makes this seemingly bland film a pivotal work of art.
Blade Runner can definitely be called a work of art, so instead of treating it as a movie, it is better to savor it as a book. Just like the development of the plot, it is to propose an experimental solution to this proposition, every character has the need to exist, and we can also deconstruct this "Blade Runner" from the main characters.
This is a film with more content than form, the existence of the male protagonist is not to please the audience, but to express something in human nature, and the question of whether he is a replicant or not has also been widely discussed by fans, because there are too many clues in the movie that imply that the male protagonist is a replicant.
This is also very much in line with cyberpunk, where the line between reality and virtual reality is blurred. The male protagonist does not have any special ability, which will give people the feeling that he is actually like most of us, and perhaps this will make it easier for people to associate ourselves from deckard.
In the original novel, the emphasis is on deckard in the process of hunting down replicants, gradually losing his humanity, while replicants are becoming more and more human. His shift in perception of replicants, his doubts about his self-worth, because he killed a living life, and even though he kept telling himself that it was just a machine, the human qualities exhibited by replicants still made his conscience condemned.
From the appearance to the ending, the deckard in the film is an intrinsic change in the heart, especially the appearance of the heroine Rachael, and the impact of the amazing act of the replicant boss Roy in the final battle. In the end, Harrison Ford's frightened expression was also very well performed.
He began to think about whether replicants were life, replicants, although man-made, had human qualities, were self-aware, and were not willing to be enslaved, and Terry achieved his goal of making humans more human.-like.
The opening credits also give the answer, and replicants are essentially human. But humanity defends itself and kills replicants who rebel against them, which is contrary to human morality since ancient times.
When you kill people at will, you are not a human being in the age of civilization, you are a wild man in the primeval forest, you are not wrong, you must kill a life that threatens you in order to protect yourself. And the reason why human beings are human beings is because people know how to think, know how to understand others, and know how to be kind, so we have morality, we have right and wrong, and we have good and evil.
It's just that the humans in Blade Runner have begun to lose some of their humanity. This is worth our reflection, are we now like the people in the movie who have lost our essence as human beings? Fortunately, there is a deckard who can self-doubt and conscience condemnation, in fact, this is also what each of us should torture ourselves.
None of us should be so cold-blooded, let alone killers.
The heroine, the female replicant Rachael, is a very, very critical presence. Through this role, the author makes the point that memory is a key factor in shaping the soul. Memory also became the centerpiece of the discussion in the sequel Blade Runner 2049.
The "human nature test" can identify replicants precisely because replicants only have a 4-year lifespan, lack of life experience, and do not have too many emotional reactions. When the rachael was implanted in the memory, the deckard's humanity test seemed to fail...
This scene can be extended to a very interesting question, if you lose your memory, will you still be the original you?
Maybe you are still the original you, your parents have given you some talent and personality, when you encounter the same thing, you will still make the same decision; maybe you are no longer the original you, at least not the current you, because sometimes one thing can change a person, people are fickle.
When a replicant has memories, perhaps those memories have changed the person, shaped the person, and let the person know who he is, what should be done, and what should not be done.
Like Rachael, she never considered herself a replicant, really just like a living person. Although she still had to recognize herself in the end.
Replicant boss Roy Batty is undoubtedly the most brilliant character in the whole film, in fact, he also has memories with Rachael, but his memory is only 4 years, and it is all his own personal experience.
He has the instinct to survive, and at this time he is like some humans, killing people in order to survive. He and his compatriots were enslaved, sent on dangerous exploration missions, and suffered a lifetime of disasters, and no one could understand them, and even many viewers could not put themselves in their shoes, after all, these scenes were not filmed, and could only be left for the audience to imagine, how painful their lives were.
They felt the pain, so they chose to resist. From the moment of the rebellion, he is no longer a controlled replicant, but, as the genetic engineer predicted, the replicant can eventually be like a human being, with the right to freedom, with fear, with anger, with hatred.
And after he embarked on a life-sustaining journey, he learned another human emotion, love.
This prompted him to make an amazing move in the finale, and from that moment on, he was already more human than human. What he realized was also the discussion of the meaning of life conveyed by Blade Runner.
Death is the end of life, and you must accept the moment of death.
Roy Batty is finally willing to face death, when a person can face death, he will surely know what is life, life is always short, he accepted this fact, accepted his own destiny.
All the grief of the past, and thus faded, Roy Batty looked back on his life, before he only saw slavery, saw just 4 years, and finally he saw all his adventures, and the grandeur of the universe.
Everyone has their own most wonderful life, which is the greatness of life.
So the more you experience, the more you remember, the more shocking the last classic line becomes:
I've seen things that you humans absolutely can't believe. I witnessed warships burning on fire along the end of the constellation Orion; I watched the c-rays shine in the darkness near Don's Gate of Joyce; All these moments will eventually pass with time. Just as tears disappeared in the rain. Moments of death. It's here.
Just a few words, summed up a person's life.
Maybe that's the truth of life, so brilliant. Just no matter how many memories, they will eventually disappear like tears soaked in the rain, disappearing with time.
To burn twice as brightly, the burning time must be cut in half. - Blade Runner