A Review: by Me

Rating: 6/10 (6 May 2019)

Before I begin, let me state that I am writing this movie review because my teacher assigned me to. However, the following statements are my honest opinions. In this of Blade Runner review, I will be discussing three different topics: aesthetics, costuming, and setting.
Throughout the entire movie, one thing that really stood out to me was the overall aesthetics of the film. Everything is dark. Most of the lighting is dark and heavily plays on shadows. The weather is also gloomy, and the presence of rain further darkens most scenes. The entire movie is colored by shades of black and gray. For example, in the scenes where Rick is walking through streets, most of the buildings are gray, and they loom over the people walking below them. Rick's apartment also competes for the title of darkest setting in the movie. The walls are painted gray, and the corners are dark enough to conceal a person. However, the gloomiest, darkest, grayest (if that's a word), most depressing scene is the rooftop fight scene, where Roy speaks his last words. The message delivered here, that memories will eventually fade, is just as dark as the aesthetics. The lighting and scenery accompanies the darkness of the theme of Blade Runner.
The people of Blade Runner are dressed mostly in black, allowing characters to retreat into shadows. The black attire is so uniform, that I almost feel like there's a rule that outlaws colorful clothes or that all characters are stuck in their middle school emo phases. Although, I do understand how the dark clothes help push the theme and aesthetics of the movie. I do like how the main fashion trend is sort of a 1940's rich white woman meets a 1990's leather jacket wearing teenager. The costumes help draw attention to the importance of the characters in the movie. Rachel's dress is exactly that- her dress. The structure fits her perfectly and allows her to make a silent statement when she enters a scene. Rick wears a long leather coat that adds drama to action scenes.
Lastly, I wanted to compare the setting of Blade Runner with today. The movie is set in 2019, and is it currently 2019... This is kind of like the whole Back to the Future comparison. Obviously, the writers and producers didn't see 2019 being that dark and uniform, but the robot aspect might have been expected. The film came out in 1982, so the prediction of creating some sort of robotic human within 40 years is reasonable. We do have bionic prosthetics and Hanson Robotic's Sophia, but our robotic development isn't as realistic as predicted in Blade Runner. They also have an underlying theme that in this version of the future, people aren't really individuals with a purpose. At this point, most people are just living because they're alive. I find it ironic that the people who really value their memories and lives are the robots.