An intelligent masterpiece...

Rating: Null/10 (15 January 2012)

Released in 1982, Blade Runner had continuously been referred to as a must-see movie and thus it had been my intention for quite some time to watch it. The year 2007 saw the release of the 'Final Cut' version of the film, and I felt obliged to watch it for that reason. The first time I watched the movie I felt confused and didn't really get the message it contained. Some time later I revisited the movie, and boy was I amazed! I am not only fully convinced that Blade Runner accounts for the best science fiction film ever produced, I also think it's one of the best movies ever made in any genre. I find it very disturbing that the film's intelligence and superiority hasn't been fully recognized here on IMDb, owing mostly to the fact that so many people who have reviewed this film have neither the patience nor the intelligence to understand what the film really is about.
The film begins by introducing the viewer to the dark future of Los Angeles with a very powerful and visually sublime opening scene. Technology has advanced to the level where it is possible to manufacture human beings so that they cannot be detected from the real ones without a specific test. This test relies on the fact that although these humanoids, referred to as replicants, are highly intelligent and much more agile than real humans, they lack empathy. Because of their violence replicants have been banned from Earth with special police units, blade runners, hunting down and killing those who can be found. One of these blade runners is Rick Deckard, who gets a task of killing a group of replicants who have escaped to Earth from an off-world colony.
The nature of the replicants becomes obvious at the very beginning of the film, when one of them brutally shoots down a blade runner. Throughout the film the replicants show their violent and emotionless behaviour as they advance toward their goal: to meet their maker and gain more life, as they only have a programmed life span of four years. The replicants befriend J. F. Sebastian, a lonely but kind genetic designer who is the one character that gives humanity its true face amid the dark and sinister atmosphere that prevails throughout the film. The brutal murder of Sebastian along with the creator of the replicants truly make the distance between humans and replicants grow tremendously.
The film's philosophical question is the meaning of being a human. Despite the compassionlessness of the replicants the gap of them and human beings is questioned throughout the film. Particularly when Deckard cold-bloodily tells Rachael that she is nothing but a manufactured machine with unauthentic memories in a hauntingly sad scene, the treatment of replicants as nothing but engines becomes morally questionable. The true turning point takes place in the end of film, where the replicant saves Deckard's life. In his powerful last words the replicant makes Deckard aware of the fact that even he has feelings. The undertone that human behaviour of disregarding the replicants is unmissable and really sums up the message of the film. For how can human beings judge the replicants when they themselves can show such hate and monstrousity that even surpasses that of the ones they are hunting down? Especially Rachael shows just how humane even a replicant can be. The astonishingly powerful visuals act as a reminder that the humans have indeed left the very world they are living in scarred and dark. This is emphasized even more when the magical score of Vangelis is played in the background. His use of synth-driven melancholic music succeeds so fantastically well in preserving the gloomy atmosphere of the film.
I urge anyone who have mixed feelings about the film to watch it again within a few months. No doubt your feelings about the film is changed when you are better prepared for the film which demands that the viewer is patient and analyzing - this is no Adam Sandler comedy where the viewer can just sit back and enjoy the show without any brainwork involved. The film is just like the very theme behind it - the more you comprehend humanity the more complex it turns out to be. If more people gave it more thought, this underrated masterpiece would be lifted up where it belongs - right up among the best films ever produced.