Blade Runner

NB: This is a review of The Directors Cut originally released in 1992, the reason for this is that I have yet to see both the Original Cut or Final Cut.

Ridley Scott’s 1982(Original Cut) Sci-Fi masterpiece was released to average reviews, with some critics critising the pace, Sheila Benson of the LA Times refered to it as “Blade Crawler”. But with the release of the Directors Cut (1992), Blade Runner received considerably more positive reviews, and catapulted the film from being a cult film, up to a true classic.

Blade Runner’s main plot is fairly simple, it follows Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) as he searches for five replicants (Androids, who look just like humans), after one of them killed another Blade Runner (The title for people who chase Replicants) during an interview. Deckard is then brought back , or forced back by his superior to  find these replicants and retire them, another of saying killing them.

Structure as far as Blade Runner goes is similar to the classic Three Act Structure, and without giving away major plot points they do come at the right time to keep the pace of the narrative moving. Despite some criticisms of it being slow, I personally find this to be inaccurate as not once did it feel as though the film was lagging or struggling to carry on. In fact the last 45 minutes of Blade Runner are very quick as the story begins to reach it’s memorable climax.

The whole story is told almost exclusively from the point of Rick Deckard, as is the style of film noir’s, which is essentially what Blade Runner is. Deckard plays the part of the detective perfectly, living alone concentrating on his work, whilst also having the classic brash and to the point personality that is synonimus with noir detectives.

Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer) is the films antagonist, if he was to be classified. However, in the second half of the film, Batty’s apparent obviousness as an antagonist starts to fail, as we realise that all he wants is to live beyond his predetermined four year life span, that all of his model of replicants have. So is his desire to live a “bad” thing, or is it just in the way that he is going about seeking out a longer length of time to live.

Blade Runners weaknesses, are that some viewers may find it to be slow, although crawling is undoubtedly harsh. Also, the conclusion and the paper unicron has left a number of people confused over whether Deckard could possibly by a Replicant also, maybe so much a weakness, but a big piece of the plot left open.

Score: *****(5/5)

Memento

As this is the first of my film reviews, I thought I should probably start with my favourite film, which is as you may have guessed, Christopher Nolan's 2001 neo-noir Memento.

Memento tells the story of former insurance investigator Leonard Shelby (played perfectly by Guy Pearce) as he searches for the man who raped and murdered his wife, and is responsible for Leonard suffering from anterograde memory loss. A form of short term memory loss, where Leonard is unable to remember anything for more than a few moments. 

Structurally, Memento plays in reverse chronological order, for the most part anyway. The colour sequences are primarily of Leonard searching for his wife's killer, whilst the black and white section has Leonard talking on the phone to an unknown person about his past, and how came to the situation he is in. To simplify, the colour sequences run "backwards", whilst the black and white run in correct chronological order.

The reason for the structure is clear, and in terms of the story, essential. Without the use of the structure we would witness the narrative unfold from an objective perspective, and would be more aware of what has happened than Leonard is. With it running backwards, we experience it from Leonard's perspective, which gives us a very subjective view of the story.

The lead character of Leonard, as previously mentioned played perfectly by Guy Pearce comes across as first being a one dimensional character who is simply out for vengeance, but as the film progresses we see pieces of his past and his actions that build this complicated character, who struggles on in the attempt to find his wife's killer with this major block in front of him at all times.

The two main supporting characters of Teddy (Joe Pantoliano), the man Leonard kills at the beginning (or the end, depending on how you view it) as he believes him to be the killer. As well as Natalie (Carrie-Ann Moss), a bar maid who helps Leonard track down Teddy. Are both played superbly, bringing out these characters that would just as soon help Leonard as they would plot and use him to their own ends.

Delivering a final verdict on this film is easy for me, as I would highly recommend it to anyone for a multitude of reasons, some of which have been discussed above. Quite simply it is a must see film.

Score: *****(5/5)