A sci-fi classic with large themes

Rating: 8/10 (8 October 2017)

I wasn't sure which version to choose but landed on the final cut for this review. I remember seeing the film at a much young age but not understanding much of it at the time. I read Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? a few years ago and enjoyed it as I do most of the author's work. The world built in Ridley Scott's film and the novel along with the complex philosophical questions proposed by this work of fiction make this piece of entertainment more engaging than just simple sci-fi or action movie. The film begins with a block of text explaining that the Tyrell Corporation has advanced artificial intelligence to a stage where they are equal if not better than humans. The resulting replicants are used in off- world colonization until a violent mutiny makes them outlaws on the planet Earth. Blade Runners are bounty hunters that hunt down these replicants.
The initial scene shows Leon Kowalski (Brion James) undergoing a strange interview about a turtle flipped over in the desert and his memory of his mother when Leon stands up and shoots the interviewer. Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is eating noodles when Gaff (Edward James Olmos) picks him up in his flying car. The skyline is enchanting and the visuals in this film are still stunning twenty-five years later. Deckard receives an assignment from Bryant (M. Emmet Walsh) over whiskey. Skin-jobs, the derisive term for replicants, have taken over a ship and snuck back on Earth. Deckard refuses because he quit the job of being a blade runner but Bryant threatens him into cooperating. Deckard is given a list of Nexus 6 replicants to hunt down and heads to the Tyrell Corporation headquarters to test the Voight-Kampff machine to see if it can identify a replicant or human.
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