Blade Runner - The Final Cut (SPOILERS)

[davejames]

From a storytelling standpoint, I think the irony of the machine teaching the man about humanity to be more powerful. Deckard operates like a robot, worn-out, unfeeling (very much the film noir hard-boiled detective) but through his experience with Roy is able to regain his emotions and perhaps begin to appreciate the Replicants as sentient beings (as Rachael is). Such a rooftop change of sentiment would also explain well why he decides to be "finished" with being a Blade Runner. Personal preference, of course, but I feel the end of the film has more meaning with Deckard as a man and not a Replicant.

Yeah, I just got done watching this movie for the first time in years, and the overall sense to me was that Deckard was human. I think fans have gotten a little too carried away over the years looking for tiny little "clues" that say otherwise, but the movie doesn't really seem to be hinting towards that at all. There might be a tiny bit of ambiguity about it (as Ford rightly believed there should be), but that's about all.

As for the movie itself... I have to say I'm still not all that crazy about it. I get that's it's film noir, but Ridley Scott seems a little TOO focused on the style and atmosphere here; there's not much of a story, and the movie doesn't really explore it's themes in any real or interesting way. We see a few glimpses of humanity and emotion in the replicants, and we're made to wonder who else could or couldn't be one... but that's about it.

I'm a big fan of this subject matter, but the movie just doesn't give me a whole lot to chew over or think about afterwards. Certainly nothing like what BSG has done with the idea. Or even TNG with Data.

 

[Deckerd]

I'm a big fan of this subject matter, but the movie just doesn't give me a whole lot to chew over or think about afterwards. Certainly nothing like what BSG has done with the idea. Or even TNG with Data.

Ah the luxury of having hundreds of hours to explore a theme rather than a couple of hours.

 

[The Borg Queen]

So what matters isn't what Deckard is, it's who he chooses to be.

Mm, how Starfleet of you.

 

[David cgc]

Personally, I find it believable that Deckard is a replicant. The unicorn dream suggests this, as does Gaff's "you've done a man's job sir, but are you sure you are a man?" The italicized portion is cut from the film, but I think it captures the original intention.

I think Deckard is human, because too much of the story wouldn't make sense thematically if he wasn't, but the important part is that he could just as easily be a replicant. The fact that you can't really be sure emphasizes the point of the film that the replicants are still living, thinking, feeling people, even though they were built instead of born, so much so that this most human of humans might be one.

I think the important part of the line you quoted is the cut part after that one. "But are you sure you are a man? It's getting hard to tell these days." That fits in with Gaff letting Deckard go even though he knew what he would do; Gaff just can't tell the difference anymore, and decided a difference that makes no difference is no difference.

 

[Lonemagpie]

The voice over was good, despite what Harrison Ford said in retrospect. This is because he's a professional and couldn't actually make it so cheesy it would reflect badly on him and the film.

He actually trimmed out a lot of the voiceover that was scripted. (I've often seen it written that the voiceover was added late, at the studio's insistence, but there's actually much more voiceover dialogue in the copy of the shooting script that I've got...)

 

[misskim86]

I read an interview where Ridley Scott confirmed Deckard is a replicant.

 

[Deckerd]

I read an interview where Ridley Scott confirmed Deckard is a replicant.

I'm always suspicious about these 'long afterwards' statements, since I suspect they are driven more by mammon than philosophy. The legend is that the studio wouldn't buy the hero being a robot, so it was suppressed in the film. It all sounds like fuel to the flames to me.

 

[Cary L. Brown]

I read an interview where Ridley Scott confirmed Deckard is a replicant.

Sigh...

Ridley Scott did no such thing. He stated that in HIS eye, he thought Deckerd was. At the time, he was making it ambiguous. He later decided that's what he, personally, thinks.

Ridley Scott is NOT the only person associated with this. Not by a long shot. His eventual "conversation" to a perspective he didn't originally hold... is sort of like Lucas deciding that "Han wouldn't shoot first" twenty years later.

If you want to say anyone, or anything, is the "main authority," it's Phillip K. Dick's original novella. If you want to talk about the movie, well... Scott is one man who worked on this film with a large number of other people. If the scriptwriter says "he's not" and the actor says "he's not" and the interviews with the director, at the time, said "well, that's up to YOU to decide," well... at most, I'd say it's INTENTIONALLY AMBIGUOUS.

Why you'd come into a conversation and throw down a "challenge" comment like that is... well, not the first time I've seen you do that, but c'mon, this is a CONVERSATION. Take part in the conversation... don't come in, stomp your feet, and just say "you're all wrong, here's the truth, now shut up" (which is, essentially, what you just did, isn't it?)

If you want to talk about what YOU, PERSONALLY, believe... I'm sure we'd all love to hear it.

 

[misskim86]

Cary calm down some

Anyway I really don't see how you can claim that "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" is the main "authority" here because that book is nothing like the movie. The movie is its own really, it's my opinion of course but I really don't see how you can connect the two except for certain elements.

So when Ridley Scott claims that Deckard is in fact a replicant I take it as Canon, if you don't, fine that's great, but if there are tons and tons of clues, the directors edition even more clues, and the director himself claiming that that's the case.. Well for me it's pretty obvious

 

[Hermiod]

Yes, can we keep things calm here please ? I'd hate for yet another one of my threads to be derailed by yet another unfriendly argument when we're talking about a movie. A bloody good movie, sure, but it's just a movie.

I thank everyone for their answers.

 

[davejames]

I'm a big fan of this subject matter, but the movie just doesn't give me a whole lot to chew over or think about afterwards. Certainly nothing like what BSG has done with the idea. Or even TNG with Data.

Ah the luxury of having hundreds of hours to explore a theme rather than a couple of hours.

Ha ha, true. But even in those two hours, I didn't feel like Scott really did much with the idea. He had this great premise and a great set of characters, but he doesn't really explore either one. Instead the movie is only about exploring this dark, futuristic city for two hours (with a little bit of a dry detective story thrown in here and there). Except for maybe the very end, the replicants are just complete ciphers.

It all makes for a cool little tone poem, I guess. But I really wanted to see him do more with the concept than that.

 

[Steve Roby]

So when Ridley Scott claims that Deckard is in fact a replicant I take it as Canon, if you don't, fine that's great, but if there are tons and tons of clues, the directors edition even more clues, and the director himself claiming that that's the case.. Well for me it's pretty obvious

Why? He not only didn't write the original novel (not a novella or novelette, btw), he also didn't write the movie. Why does he have the exclusive right to dictate what it means?

 

[Hermiod]

^Ultimately, any movie belongs to its director, not the writers, the producers, the actors or anyone else.

 

[Smiley]

^Ultimately, any movie belongs to its director, not the writers, the producers, the actors or anyone else.

Tell that to David Fincher and William Shatner.

I'm of the mind that once a movie is released to the public, they have the right to decide for themselves what any given part of a movie means. It's an interactive process between the filmmaker(s) and the audience, not a mandate from on high.

 

[Hermiod]

^Ultimately, any movie belongs to its director, not the writers, the producers, the actors or anyone else.

Tell that to David Fincher and William Shatner.

I'm of the mind that once a movie is released to the public, they have the right to decide for themselves what any given part of a movie means. It's an interactive process between the filmmaker(s) and the audience, not a mandate from on high.

Oh certainly, my point is that the name on a book is that of its author, the name on a painting is the artist who painted it and the name on a film is that of its director.

 

[misskim86]

So when Ridley Scott claims that Deckard is in fact a replicant I take it as Canon, if you don't, fine that's great, but if there are tons and tons of clues, the directors edition even more clues, and the director himself claiming that that's the case.. Well for me it's pretty obvious

Why? He not only didn't write the original novel (not a novella or novelette, btw), he also didn't write the movie. Why does he have the exclusive right to dictate what it means?

There isn't an original novel, just a novel which Bladerunner borrowed ideas from.

 

[Harvey]

Artistically, we tend to identify movies as the product of a director first (although we make certain exceptions--writers such as Paddy Chayefsky or Charlie Kaufman or Aaron Sorkin, for example, or action movie actors such as Jean Claude Van Damme or Steven Segal).

Financially, and contractually, however, the producers (and, sometimes above them, the studio executives) are the ones with final ownership of a film. Usually (very influential directors might be able to control more of the ownership, but this is usually not the case).

Of course, Ridley Scott operates on a whole other level. He is notorious for being a micromanager of every single detail found in a film. Secondly, in the case of Blade Runner, the film is called "Ridley Scott's final cut of the sci-fi epic" for a reason. He's been the one with the final say in this case, and I'd defer to his judgment if what one is looking for is a definitive answer.

 

[Harvey]

So when Ridley Scott claims that Deckard is in fact a replicant I take it as Canon, if you don't, fine that's great, but if there are tons and tons of clues, the directors edition even more clues, and the director himself claiming that that's the case.. Well for me it's pretty obvious

Why? He not only didn't write the original novel (not a novella or novelette, btw), he also didn't write the movie. Why does he have the exclusive right to dictate what it means?

There isn't an original novel, just a novel which Bladerunner borrowed ideas from.

Blade Runner is based on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Phillip K. Dick, as per the credits. Significant changes were made to the original source material (and the title was drawn from yet another source), but it is firmly rooted in Dick's original writing, with a couple of scenes that are almost verbatim.

 

[flandry84]

As I've said before on this topic,if Deckard is a replicant,what was the point of the movie?One "robot" hunting another....Scott should just have made a Transformers movie.

 

[Christopher]

^Ultimately, any movie belongs to its director, not the writers, the producers, the actors or anyone else.

That's called the auteur theory, and there are a great many people, myself included, who think it's bull. A film is a collaborative creation, and any director who'd disrespect all his or her collaborators by insisting on being seen as the sole creator is a jerk.

And speaking as a storyteller myself, I disagree with the assumption that the audience has to interpret a story the way its creator intended. You're not supposed to be passive sponges. You're supposed to be stimulated to think about what you read or watch, to interpret it, to find your own meaning in it. I've sometimes had readers interpret something I wrote in a drastically different way from how I intended it, and I've often disagreed with them, but sometimes they've suggested things I thought were valid and interesting even though they never occurred to me at the time. Either way, it's their right as active, thinking readers to interpret the work in their own way, to bring something of themselves into the process. And it's something to be proud of if you write (or direct) something rich and multifaceted enough that different people are able to derive different meanings from it. If you just passively absorb what I feed to you, then I haven't done my job, which is to stimulate your imagination and curiosity.

So while what Ridley Scott intended is worth taking into account, so is what the other creators intended, and it's up to you, the viewer, to come to your own conclusion about what the story means to you. Blade Runner is more than rich enough to give you plenty to think about and sort out for yourself.

As I've said before on this topic,if Deckard is a replicant,what was the point of the movie?One "robot" hunting another....Scott should just have made a Transformers movie.

If you think that, then you've totally missed the point, which is that you don't have to be biologically human to be a person.