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[emdawgz1]

If you are in the NYC area its a real treat!!

From the NYTimes

A Cult Classic Restored, Again
By FRED KAPLAN

IT’S been 25 years since the release of “Blade Runner,” Ridley Scott’s science fiction cult film turned classic, but only now has his original vision reached the screen.

“Blade Runner: The Final Cut” — as the definitive director’s cut is titled — was scheduled to play at the New York Film Festival Saturday night, opens at the Ziegfeld in New York and the Landmark in Los Angeles on Friday, and comes out in December in a five-disc set with scads of extra features.

An earlier director’s cut played in theaters 15 years ago to great fanfare and is still available on DVD. But the new one is something different: darker, bleaker, more beautifully immersive.

The film, based on Philip K. Dick’s novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?,” takes place in Los Angeles in 2019. It follows a cop named Deckard (played by Harrison Ford) who hunts down androids — or, in the film’s jargon, replicants— that have escaped from their slave cells on outer-space colonies and are trying to blend in back on Earth.

What’s hypnotic about the film is its seamless portrait of the future, a sleek retro Deco glossed on neon-laced decay: overcrowded cities roamed by hustlers, strugglers and street gangs mumbling a multicultural argot, the sky lit by giant corporate logos and video billboards hyping exotic getaways on other planets, where most English-speaking white people seem to have fled.

Mr. Scott designed this world in minute detail and shot it at night, from oblique angles, mainly on Warner Brothers’ back lot in Burbank, Calif., pumping in smoke and drizzling in rain.

“I’ve never paid quite so much attention to a movie, ever,” Mr. Scott said in a telephone interview from Washington, where he’s shooting a spy thriller. “But we had to create a world that supported the story’s premise, made it believable. Why do you watch a film seven times? Because somebody’s done it right and transported you to its world.”

He created this world from what he saw around him. “I was spending a lot of time in New York,” he said. “The city back then seemed to be dismantling itself. It was marginally out of control. I’d also shot some commercials in Hong Kong. This was before the skyscrapers. The streets seemed medieval. There were 4,000 junks in the harbor, and the harbor was filthy. You wouldn’t want to fall in; you’d never get out alive. I wanted to film ‘Blade Runner’ in Hong Kong, but couldn’t afford to.

When “Blade Runner” came out in June 1982 it received mixed reviews and lost money. The summer’s big hit was “E. T.,” Steven Spielberg’s tale of a cute alien phoning home from the tidy suburbs. Few wanted to watch a movie that implied the world was about to go drastically downhill.

“Here we are 25 years on,” Mr. Scott said, “and we’re seriously discussing the possibility of the end of this world by the end of the century. This is no longer science fiction.”

The special effects that produced this vision were amazing for their day. Created with miniature models, optics and double exposures, they seemed less artificial than many computer effects of a decade later. But like film stock, they faded with time.

For the new director’s cut, the special-effects footage was digitally scanned at 8,000 lines per frame, four times the resolution of most restorations, and then meticulously retouched. The results look almost 3-D.

The film’s theme of dehumanization has also been sharpened. What has been a matter of speculation and debate is now a certainty: Deckard, the replicant-hunting cop, is himself a replicant. Mr. Scott confirmed this: “Yes, he’s a replicant. He was always a replicant.”

This may disappoint some viewers. Deckard is the film’s one person with a conscience. If he’s a replicant, it means that there are no more decent human beings.

“It’s a pretty dark world,” Mr. Scott acknowledged. “How many decent human beings do you meet these days?”

The clue to Deckard’s true nature comes in a scene that was cut from the original release and only recently unearthed by Charles de Lauzirika, Mr. Scott’s assistant and the restoration’s producer, In the film, Deckard falls in love with Rachael (played by Sean Young), a secretary at the Tyrell Corporation, the conglomerate that makes replicants. She discovers that she’s a replicant too. Her memories of childhood were implanted by Tyrell to make her think she’s human.

In the last scene of Mr. Scott’s version, Deckard leads Rachael out of his apartment. He notices an origami figure of a unicorn on the floor. A fellow cop has often left such figures outside replicants’ rooms. In an earlier scene, Deckard was thinking about a unicorn. Looking at the cutout now, he realizes that the authorities know what’s in his mind, that the unicorn is a planted memory, that he’s a replicant and that he and Rachael are both now on the run. They get into the elevator. The door slams. The end.

Neither this scene nor any unicorn appeared in the 1982 release. That version ended with Deckard and Rachael escaping, driving through green countryside, Deckard telling us in his Philip Marlowe voice-over — which ran throughout the movie — that he had learned Rachael is a new type of replicant, built to live as long as humans. They smile. The end.

How to explain such a drastic change? The veteran television producers Bud Yorkin and Jerry Perenchio put up one third of the film’s $22 million budget and the completion bond, which stipulated that if the film went over budget they had to pay the overrun but would also take ownership of the movie. The film went $7 million over budget.

Preview screenings were disastrous. Crowds went to see the new Harrison Ford movie, thinking it would be like “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” and they were befuddled. Mr. Yorkin and Mr. Perenchio, whose relations with Mr. Scott were always tense, took over.

In some accounts, Mr. Scott was kicked off the picture and had nothing to do with the voice-over or the happy ending. This isn’t quite accurate.

“I was in a minor argument over it for about six hours,” Mr. Scott recalled. “Then I was fully on board.” He had contemplated a voice-over early on, inspired by Martin Sheen’s in “Apocalypse Now.” When the previews bombed, he revived the idea and had his screenwriters, Hampton Fancher and David Peoples, work on it. The new owners discarded that draft and hired Roland Kibbee, a frequent writer for the detective show “Colombo,” to do a rewrite.

Mr. Scott didn’t like the revision, but he edited it into the movie anyway. He also asked Stanley Kubrick for outtakes of rolling countryside that were shot for “The Shining,” and used them as backdrop for the desired happy ending.

“I went along with the idea that we had to do certain things to get audiences interested,” Mr. Scott recalled. “I later realized that once I adopted that line, I was selling my soul to the devil, inch by inch drifting from my original conception.”

“My original concept,” he said, “was almost operatic: the cadences, the deliberate pacing. I mean that in the sense of the best comic strips, the ones that adults read, which are very operatic. ‘Batman’ — you can’t get more operatic than that.”

Afterward, Mr. Scott moved on to other films. In 1989 a Warner Brothers executive, going through the vaults, came across a 70-millimeter print of Mr. Scott’s original cut. In May 1990 the print was lent to a Los Angeles theater showing a festival of 70-millimeter films. Fans lined up around the block. The same thing happened when two art houses screened it in Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Sensing a windfall, Warner Brothers announced the release of a director’s cut and brought in Mr. Scott. It was a rush job — much of the deleted footage couldn’t be found — but it was closer to what he had intended.

In 2000 Mr. Scott announced that he was working on a multidisc set that would include a polished director’s cut. But the project collapsed when the Mr. Yorkin and Mr. Perenchio wouldn’t transfer the rights.

This refusal was widely attributed to lingering bitterness. Mr. Yorkin, speaking by telephone from Los Angeles, denied that. “It’s just there was no reason for another release,” he said. “We needed an idea that would make it an event.”

Last year they realized the film’s 25th anniversary was coming up. “That was an idea we could hook it on,” Mr. Yorkin said. A deal was struck with Warner Brothers. The project was revived.

Mr. de Lauzirika plowed through 977 boxes and cans of film, stored mainly in a Burbank warehouse, and found the missing pieces — including the complete unicorn scene — along with several discs’ worth of material for DVD special features. And the technical experts restored the picture to a level of detail that would have been impossible a few years earlier.

“In many ways,” Mr. de Lauzirika said, “the delay actually helped. So all headaches aside, it’s hard to be bitter. I’m actually quite grateful.”

[WanMan]

It is interesting that a divide exists between the original theatrical release (with the narrative) and the so-called Director's Cut (without the narrative). Being that I cuaght this film during its original theatrical release I had really liked the original movie and still do to this day. I remember when I bought the Director's Cut on DVD and did so not knowing the narration was removed. The horror!

I look forward to the new release they are planning for high-definition, which I think includes multi-disk offerings.

[garyfritz]

Yeah. I haven't seen the Director's Cut, but I'm wondering how well that works without the narration. I liked the original the way it was, didn't even mind the happily-ever-after ending. I can see where the bleak ending fits the story better, but how well does it work without the narration?

[Mark_A_W]

It works fine without Narration.

However I barely remember the original version though...saw it on VHS 15 years ago or more.

Got the Soundtrack CD playing now - it's our favourite CD.

[emdawgz1]

I think blade runner was released in a bad spot. Ridley Scott had a vision that the mainstream wasnt ready for.

I think the movie works well without the narration. It lets you form your own ideas about the film w/o the narrator telling you what you're seeing.

I cant wait to get this on Blu-ray.

[zaphod]

well, a number of things beat up BladeRunner's release. the difference from Harrison Ford's Raider's movie. the dark dismal view of the future as presented in the film. a little movie called "ET" that filled movie theatres that summer.

Blade Runner is a "big" movie. needs a screen. one of the movies that made me move to home theater. it's one of the movies that has me running LaserDisc . it's a classic film. or is it TWO classic films?

the standard division around Blade runner is the argument surrounding Deckard being a replicant or not. Some say yes, some no. Ford claims that during the movie he and Scott discussed this and came to the understanding that Deckard was human. Scott has maintained for a couple of years that Deckard is a replicant and always was intended to be a replicant.

i think that the question is left ambiguous and am just paranoid/cynical enough to think that Scott and Ford's disagreeing views are intentional to maintain that ambiguity. The base question of the movie revolves around the questions of what is human. What is the defining aspects that make someone the better man.

"Are you not the good man?" asks Roy Batty of Deckard shortly before he saves Deckard's life. Batty chooses to show human compassion and selflessness by surrendering a final opportunity to win the battle before he himself succumbs leaving Deckard alive and victorious. At the end, was Batty more human than Deckard? And if so, is that because Deckard himself was not human? The ambiguity is key and important to the film.


There is however a second question that remains about the film, not so much the content but rather the presentation - Narration or no Narration?

The story goes that after audiences reacted poorly to initial screenings, Scott was required to adjust the movie in a number of ways including adding the Narration which is how i originally saw the film. To me, the Narration intensified the film's impact. I was not watching a science-fiction movie. I was watching a film noir - a new bogart, complete with trenchcoat - battling his inner demons and doubts as much as his prey.

"Sushi - that's what my ex-wife called me. Cold Fish" and with that introduction we learn almost everything about the man before us - alone. self-deprecating. beaten. both resolved and still with resolve.

The viewing of the film-noir Blade Runner heightens the future in which the film lives. This was not a science fiction movie of jetpacks and turbo-milk. all shiny and bright as the young farmer boy goes and buys a new robot with his uncle. This was a movie of grit and twitchy bathroom lights and oldsmobiles and strippers who just happened to be grown in a lab with the power to please or to kill. Or be killed.

The power of the future presented to us in Blade Runner was in the future's understated role. There was no excitement in the vision of the future the movie gave us. The future presented was just there as a matter of fact. Take it or leave it - but you can't help to believe it.

The Narration sharpens this understatement by casting the movie out of science-fiction and into detective and by becoming almost a third player in the cat and mouse between Batty and Deckard. Even at the end, when Batty dies, the Narration returns to question Deckard about what is human. what is not.

When the "Director's Cut" of Blade Runner came out the Narrartion was pulled and I watched a very different movie - it was indeed as if a main character has been pulled - but more so the entire film feel had changed. No longer was i watching a film-noir but rather i was now watching a pure science-fiction film. A film that was still without the turbo-milk and cute aliens, more like 2001 or a Clockwork Orange. This was British science fiction - a Kubrick Science fiction. And it was good. For while i don't really believe that the future will hold cute aliens amidst the new technologies, i do believe that it will hold squallor and self-doubt and pain and in the end, just a bit of hope.

So for me, Blade Runner is two films. One is the narrated film-noir and one is the dark science-fiction that will one day happen.

Unfortunately, i think that the new release on DVD will not include a narrated version for all the efforts about which i have read seem to circle around tidying up the removal of the narration that was not done to the best of today's abilities.

I would love to have both movies on dvd - hd-dvd if possible, but i suspect that i will have to remain happy with the film-noir being on LaserDisc only. Such is life.

[emdawgz1]

[emdawgz1]

More news.....

http://www.brmovie.com/BR_Special_Edition.htm


Blade Runner Final Cut (Special Edition) DVDs that will be released in December 2007.

There will be five versions. The new remaster... and.

There are SEVEN different DVD sets on pre-order at present (in the US - I wish I could say all countries would have exactly the same releases, but it seems I can't) - which you choose will depend on where you stand on the range of "like the movie" to "totally obsessed" (like me). What you get depends on whether you want 2, 4 or 5 discs, Standard DVD, HD-DVD or Blu-Ray and if you want the super-everything including collectibles briefcase or not (I'm not kidding). Of course relative value for money may factor into your decision. Here is a breakdown of the sets (these latest definitions courtesy of Amazon.com).



The Blade Runner Final Cut Two-Disc Special Edition will contain:

Two Standard definition widescreen DVDs.
Disc One:

RIDLEY SCOTT'S ALL-NEW "FINAL CUT" VERSION OF THE FILM
Restored and remastered with added and extended scenes, added lines, new and cleaner special effects and all new 5.1 Dolby Digital Audio.

Also includes:

- Commentary by Ridley Scott
- Commentary by executive producer/co-screenwriter Hampton Fancher and co-screenwriter David Peoples; producer Michael Deely and production executive Katherine Haber
- Commentary by visual futurist Syd Mead; production designer Lawrence G. Paull, art director David L. Snyder and special photographic effects supervisors Douglas Trumbull, Richard Yuricich and David Dryer
Disc Two:

DOCUMENTARY DANGEROUS DAYS: MAKING BLADE RUNNER
A feature-length authoritative documentary revealing all the elements that shaped this hugely influential cinema landmark. Cast, crew, critics and colleagues give a behind-the-scenes, in-depth look at the film -- from its literary roots and inception through casting, production, visuals and special effects to its controversial legacy and place in Hollywood history."


and...

The Blade Runner Final Cut Four-Disc Collector's Edition will contain:

Four Standard definition widescreen DVDs.

From Warner: "The Four-Disc Collector's Edition includes everything from the 2-Disc Special Edition plus three additional versions of the film, as well as an 'Enhancement Archive' bonus disc of enhanced content that includes 90 minutes of deleted footage and rare or never-before-seen items in featurettes and galleries that cover the film's amazing history, production teams, special effects, impact on society, promotional trailers, TV spots, and much more.
Disc Three:

1982 THEATRICAL VERSION
This is the version that introduced U.S. movie-going audiences to a revolutionary film with a new and excitingly provocative vision of the near-future. It contains Deckard/Harrison Ford's character narration and has Deckard and Rachel's (Sean Young) "happy ending" escape scene.

1982 INTERNATIONAL VERSION
Also used on U.S. home video, laserdisc and cable releases up to 1992. This version is not rated, and contains some extended action scenes in contrast to the Theatrical Version.

1992 DIRECTOR'S CUT
The Director's Cut omits Deckard's voiceover narration and removes the "happy ending" finale. It adds the famously-controversial "unicorn" sequence, a vision that Deckard has which suggests that he, too, may be a replicant.
Disc Four:

BONUS DISC - "Enhancement Archive": 90 minutes of deleted footage and rare or never-before-seen items in featurettes and galleries that cover the film's amazing history, production teams, special effects, impact on society, promotional trailers, TV spots, and much more.

- Featurette The Electric Dreamer: Remembering Philip K. Dick
- Featurette Sacrificial Sheep: The Novel vs. The Film
- Philip K. Dick: The Blade Runner Interviews (Audio)
- Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep Cover Gallery (Images)
- The Art of Blade Runner (Image Galleries)
- Featurette Signs of the Times: Graphic Design
- Featurette Fashion Forward: Wardrobe & Styling
- Screen Tests: Rachel & Pris
- Featurette The Light That Burns: Remembering Jordan Cronenweth
- Unit Photography Gallery
- Deleted & Alternate Scenes
- 1982 Promotional Featurettes
- Trailers & TV Spots
- Featurette Promoting Dystopia: Rendering the Poster Art
- Marketing & Merchandise Gallery (Images)
- Featurette Deck-A-Rep: The True Nature of Rick Deckard
- Featurette Nexus Generation: Fans & Filmmakers"


and for HD and BR folks...

The Blade Runner Final Cut Five-Disc Complete Collector's Editions will contain:

Five high definition widescreen DVDs in choice of HD-DVD or Blu-Ray.

The Five-Disc Complete Collector's Edition includes everything from the Four-Disc Collector's Edition plus...
Disc Five:

WORKPRINT VERSION
This rare version of the film is considered by some to be the most radically different of all the Blade Runner cuts. It includes an altered opening scene, no Deckard narration until the final scenes, no "unicorn" sequence, no Deckard/Rachel "happy ending," altered lines between Batty (Rutger Hauer) and his creator Tyrell (Joe Turkell), alternate music and much more.

Also includes:

- Commentary by Paul M. Sammon, author of Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner
- Featurette All Our Variant Futures: From Workprint to Final Cut"



NICE!!!

[zaphod]

[jask]

I am looking forward to this one!!
Zaphod that was quite the review! I remember the first time I rewatched the movie after having the "deckard is a replicant" talk with a pal, WOW it was a whole new movie....but the scene with Roy has always been the crux and the end point for most arguments either way...the ambiguity is a critical to the movie.
I think this is one of the best romances ever put to film, and always hated the happily ever after scene.

[zaphod]

yes virginia, there is a ridley scott

[garyfritz]

Yes, zaphod, outstanding review. I particularly agree with this point:

[zaphod]

[garyfritz]

[WanMan]

You know, this movie and the question as to whether Deckard is or is not a replicant will continue well beyond our lives. Ain't that interesting?

zaphod, you pretty much summed up what I thought about the narration in the movie. Sure, its a Sci-Fi movie made during one of the hurried period of science fiction movie making, but the narration pulled back that sometimes overpowering and overly needed sense to turn this into a completely different kind of movie. I wasn't looking for another SW or ST movie, and this fit in perfectly.

[AnalogRocks]

I've never seen this movie.

I am a huge sci-fi fan, I read the book "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" back in 1986. I always meant to see it but never did.

I love just about all Sci Fi and I own the game Bladerunner, but, I had a look, I never played it! I had to think back to 1998 to figure out why. I bought the game and the next week I got the internet. Case solved.

Just from Zap's description I **think** I would preper the film noir version. I love the old black and white movies with naration (Bogart) and I loved the 2 Max Payne game's. There's a few other games I have owned and can't remember the tittle's of that were Film Noir based as well that I enjoyed.

The one thing I remember seeing in the reviews when it came out on Laser Disk was the opening scene. Then, while I was watching "The 5th Element" the whole city scape reminded me of that.

Should I spring for the super duper delux HD-DVD version and become a replicant...er...convert? Should I dig out the old game and give it a go after I see the movie?

Whadda ya think?

[AnalogRocks]

I've never seen this movie.

I am a huge sci-fi fan, I read the book "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" back in 1986. I always meant to see it but never did.

I love just about all Sci Fi and I own the game Bladerunner, but, I had a look, I never played it! I had to think back to 1998 to figure out why. I bought the game and the next week I got the internet. Case solved.

Just from Zap's description I **think** I would preper the film noir version. I love the old black and white movies with naration (Bogart) and I loved the 2 Max Payne game's. There's a few other games I have owned and can't remember the tittle's of that were Film Noir based as well that I enjoyed.

The one thing I remember seeing in the reviews when it came out on Laser Disk was the opening scene. Then, while I was watching "The 5th Element" the whole city scape reminded me of that.

Should I spring for the super duper delux HD-DVD version and become a replicant...er...convert? Should I dig out the old game and give it a go after I see the movie?

Whadda ya think?

[jask]

Just to be clear,I enjoy all versions of this movie (flame suit on )

The film Noir inner monologue was a cool effect and set the mood (and has a source and later imitation)of the first release.
The absence of the narration in the directors cut sets a tone that is so different that the impact and urgency are changed,and I personally feel that that "empty space" and detachment it creates for the viewer are part of the impact that Scott originally intended. Now when I watch the 1st release I feel like I am watching Mulholland falls or Chinatown, and with the directors cut more of a 1984 or Children of Men experience.... still one of the great neglected classics

[WanMan]

I am not knocking the Director's Cut release, but rather the lack in studio effort to release the original theatrical movie on DVD. They just assumed one thing and were completely wrong.

[zaphod]

i agree completely with both Jask and WanMan. i too like both movies. there are very different movies and i really enjoy both. The film-noir version might edge out the science-fiction version a bit, but both are head and shoulders above many many other films that i enjoy.

It is annoying that there has been no dvd release of the film-noir version. The criterion laserdisc is good, but dvd would be so much better. HD moreso. i am really happy that the super-uber space-dollars 5 disk version will include the narrated version. December is a very very long way off this year.

[emdawgz1]