Epitome of film as an art form

Rating: Null/10 (19 October 2003)

I wasn't even born when "Blade Runner" made its theatrical debut, and for that I consider myself lucky. Had I been alive and theater-going in 1982 I might've become jaded against the film, only acknowledging the muddled 1982 release. I come from a generation whose first experience with "Blade Runner" came on the various home video formats, when we were blessed to behold the 1992 director's cut of the film. The director's cut was the first version I saw, hearing horror stories of the theatrical release. Having seen both now, I can fully appreciate having the directors cut as a definitive version.

SPOILERS AHEAD
Harrison Ford plays Rick Deckard, also called Blade Runner. Blade runners are insinuated to be elite police units whose job it is to hunt down "replicants", humanoid androids that were built by the Tyrell Corporation to serve humans. After a replicant revolt on an off-world mining colony, replicants are considered threats to society. When they are detected they are destroyed, or as the opening crawl takes pains to emphasize, 'retired'. Deckard is assigned to hunt down 5 replicants who have just escaped from an off-world colony and come to LA. His pursuit of the androids becomes an in depth exploration of what it means to be human, and chiefly why the humans can condemn the replicants for wanting to be like them.
A common complaint I here from critics of "Blade Runner" is that it hasn't aged well. Sadly, this is a truth I have to concede. Audiences new to the feature that go into it without predetermined reverence end up laughing at the Vangelis music, dated vision of the year 2019, and sadly even Rutger Hauer's appearance in the climactic scene.
"Blade Runner" is a beautiful movie, from the opening iconic image of future Los Angeles seemingly ablaze to the scenes of flying cars weaving in between monolithic skyscrapers beneath the perpetually raining sky.
Philosophical overtones are strong throughout every aspect of the film, right down to the art-deco/neo gothic architecture of the city: the Tyrell corporation building is a gargantuan Mayan pyramid that rises about the pollution ridden cloud that cloaks the city of Los Angeles. In fact, the only time you see any sunlight in the movie is when it shares the frame with the Tyrell building. The pyramid shape of the building, the presence in the sunlight above the clouds, and the fact that it houses a creator of life (be that artificial) all convey the presence of a god figure. Indeed Tyrell's role in the movie is that of the god figure. This is unadulterated Nietzsche: god made man, and then man killed god.
Differences between the original version and the director's cut are not subtle, they are glaring. The studio thought that the audience at large would need help in understanding the film, so they had Ford record an irritatingly cheesy Bogart film-noir narration. Legend has it that Ford intentionally made the narration awful in the hopes that the studio would consider it too bad to use. Also, the studio tacked on an uplifting ending in which Deckard and Rachel escape to an idyllic countryside together. One of the most interesting changes however is the "unicorn dream" that Scott fought to include. Its meaning is wide open to interpretation. One possibility is the connection to the title of the Philip Dick story, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" Does Deckard's dream of an imaginary creature mean that he is in turn a fictional being? The most obvious connection is to the origami unicorn left on Deckard's doorstep at the end of the film. Does Gaff know Deckard's memories just as Deckard knew Rebecca's? Or is it a coincidence?
Memories are precious to the replicants. Each one has his or her own set of memories programmed in to make them believe they have lived full, human lives. This fact is another of the many clues which led viewers to believe Deckard was in fact a replicant himself. More than that, though, it explains why Roy spares Deckard's life at the end of the film. The cheesy narration in the original release of the film explains it thusly:

"I don't know why he saved my life. Maybe in those last moments he loved life more than he ever had before. Not just his life, anybody's life, my life. All he'd wanted were the same answers the rest of us want."
This is all fine and dandy if you want to take away the simplistic message that the replicants had become more human than the so called "real humans". The real reasoning behind Roy's grace is much more selfish. Consider the brilliant monologue he gives on the rooftop:
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die."
Roy and his fellow off-worlders have 'lived' more than any of the humans living in their urban wasteland. The replicants have been programmed with a short life span. Roy accepts the inevitability of his death and realizes that the only way his memories can survive, the only evidence of his existence, is through Deckard. Roy keeps Deckard alive because the only remaining traces of his life reside in Deckard's mind.
"Blade Runner"'s design may not have been able to withstand the test of time, but its intelligence and message are more than able to transcend the void between the 1980's and this universe.