And here I was so close to ordering Blade Runner box. Glad I didn't. I think I'll just stick to my theatrical release then and leave you guys and Ridley in peace. Because if it's made "completely obvious" that Deckard is a replicant, as Tom and others state, it lessens the impact of the film. I would almost go so far as to say that it ruins it. Almost.
It's not my personal interpretation. It's Scott's. You know, the dude who made the movie?Originally Posted by DKDArtagnan
Seriously - this isn't a case of ambiguity. At all. It's obvious. Seriously - if you think Blade Runner is 'ambiguous', you might want to watch Jodorowsky's Holy Mountain or Tarkovsky's Solaris sometime. Or how about E. Elias Merhige's Begotten? Those are ambiguous.
Blade Runner? Not so much.
I don't understand the evidence that Deckard can't be a replicant because he get beat up alot.
Also it may have been the case that Ridley wanted Ford to believe he is playing a human rather then a replicant who thinks he is human. As to not influence his performance.
Another point, I don't think that Deckard not being human underminds the "battle between man and machine" at the end. I think that's still a theme explored because these character are so human despite being synthetic. Like syntheic life imitating life. The scene where Batty is hunting Deckard is pretty animalistic despite him being anything but (a machine).
Out of curiosity, what's the subtle but unambiguous ending of Pan's Labyrinth? I haven't seen it in quite some time, so i don't remember it that clearly. Is the correct interpretation the soul-crushingly depressing one?
Rachel's question in the movie is answered - Deckard passes the Voight-Kampff (though even there there is ambiguity).
And those who prefer ambiguity can watch the original, though the film is far more elegant without the voiceover.
Because it doesn't work as such, which means that any movie goer can interpret it as simply style, or on a metaphorical rather than literal level (the latter being another one of those did you really think it through points because otherwise look for the glow, or hope no one takes flash photography and uses "red eye" as evidence that you are a replicant). You can intend things in movies, but just because you intended it to be a certain way doesn't mean it was a good decision.
That's not really what that link says (also I posted the wrong link, here you go) and it's not really relevant (the guy's still as much an expert on the movie as anyone) but it's pretty clear we're just playing for internet points at this point, right?
David People's and other people discussing this from the same book that was quoted above. Quotes:
At this point I invented a kind of contemplative voice-over for Deckard. Here, let me read it to you [Peoples now quotes from his December 15, 1980 script]
"'I wonder who designs the ones like me... and what choices we really have. I wondered if I had really loved her. I wondered which of my memories were real and which belonged to someone else. The great Tyrell hadn't designed me, but whoever had hadn't done so much better. "You're programmed, too," she told me, and she was right. In my own modest way I was a combat model. Roy Batty was my later brother.'
"Now, what I'd intended with this voice-over was mostly metaphysical," People's continues. "Deckard was supposed to be philisophically questioning himself about what it was that made him so different from Rachael and the other replicants. He was supposed to be realizing that, on the human level, they weren't so different. That Deckard wanted the same things the replicants did. The 'maker' he was refering to wasn't literally Tyrell, either. It was supposed to be God. So basically, Deckard was just musing about what it meant to be human.
"But then Ridley--" People says, laughing "--well, I think Ridley misinterpreted me. Because right about this period of time he started announcing, 'Ah-ha! Deckard's a replicant! What brilliance! How Heavy Metal!' I was sort of confused by this response, because Ridley kept giving me all this praise and credit for this terrific idea. It wasn't until many years later, when I happened to be browsing through this draft, that I suddenly realized the metaphysical material I had written could just as easily have been read to imply that Deckard was a replicant. Even though it wasn't what I meant at all. What I had meant was, we all have a maker, and we all have an incept date. We just can't address them. That's one of the similarities we had to the replicants. We couldn't go find Tyrell, but tyrell was up there somewhere. for all of us."I never thought Deckard was a replicant, either," continues Michael Deeley. "That was just a bit of bullshit, a little extra layer Ridley put in. Also an obfuscation. Not only did I never believe Deckard was a replicant, I also thought it futile to try and make him one. Harrison resisted the idea, too. But that was Ridley's pet theory, even if it didn't make sense. Why would you do that? Deckard would be the first replicant you'd knock off if you were getting rid of them. Anyway, just because you say,'Wouldn.t it be funny if Deckard was an android?' doesn't necessarily make it so."
Odd that so many people who worked on the film felt that it was ambiguous. Do I get internet points now?"Besides, Ridley and I had many concrete conversations during the editing of BR as to how to best suggest him being an android. One nice way was the scene of Deckard's eyes glowing, when harrison's at the doorway of his kitchen behind Sean Young. Ridley had blocked that out wery carefully; he purposefully put Harrison in the back ground of the shot, and slightly out of focus so that you'd only notice his eyes were glowing if you were paying attention. I love that--it's subtle. It was meant to be subtle. I don't think Ridley ever wanted to bring out a troupe of dancing bears holding up neon signs reading 'Deckard is a replicant!' Instead, he was going for something more ambiguous. Ridley himself may have definitely felt that Deckard was a replicant, but still, by the end of the picture, he intended to leave it up to the viewer to decide whether deckard was one."
Are you telling me that a director might have changed a writer's intent or script?! Well, I bet that's never ever happened before or since in the history of cinema!
I love this.
It seems more of a case that they want it to be ambiguous rather than it necessarily is ambiguous (depending on which version of the film we are talking about - a point you can keep beating certain parties about the head and shoulders with and they'll still say Blade Runner when they mean Blade Runner The Final Cut). Without the unicorn dream in the original theatrical version, sorry to all the strident types, but it's ambiguous. And it is ambiguous because Scott did not really come out and say otherwise at the time, not to mention since he didn't have complete control over that cut, he isn't the definitive voice.
But in The Final Cut, it is as it should be - the director's vision. It may not always include the best decisions, but despite the inconsistencies and lack of logical follow-throughs at times, yeah, Deckard is a replicant. Doesn't seem ambiguous to me.
I don't know what film you guys watched. In the one I watched, Batty, Deckard, Pris, all of those guys were actually the last HUMANS left. EVERYONE ELSE in the film: androids. Come on, it's sooooooo obvious.
Off the top of my head, Deckard being a replicant opens up a whole series of questions not addressed on film:
1) Given the history of replicants and the laws around their presence on Earth, why is the police department using "skin jobs" in the first place? Is there a special "Deckard" exception? Why do you need a replicant doing this job at all? If there is nothing special about Deckard vis a vis his replicant nature, why put a gun in the hands of what might be the most dangerous creation let loose on the earth, a replicant with no pre-defined end date with all of the training and knowledge that implants of years of policework would provide? With Gaff presumably shadowing Deckard to keep an eye on the "goods", why have him work alone at all? Wouldn't you keep him on a tighter leash?
2) Why if you are implanting memories (something known only to have been done with Rachel as an "experiment") would you make Deckard grizzled, on the verge of burn-out and full of self-doubt? Why require Bryant to have to fake a history with the replicant Blade Runner?
3)Why set Deckard up to be reluctant and require coercion at all? It takes a semi-obtuse threat from Bryant to get Deckard involved. Why create a problematic tool?
4)With the possibility of Deckard's own replicant nature, why would you send him alone to Voight-Kampf the supposedly most human replicant yet, placing him in the company of the one person sure to know that Deckard is a replicant in Tyrell and someone sure to put the question of what is human on everyone's mind in the person of Rachel. Did no one think to wonder what effect him having the file on Rachel having the memory implants might have on their assumably very expensive grizzled experimental replicant Blade Runner?
5) Why does Tyrell supremely preen over Rachel but make no even veiled hint, no side-long glance at what would be his greatest creation, a truly human immortal machine, per Scott?
At best, one can headcannon answers to these questions but it means providing material not there on the screen.
Aside from that, what does having Deckard as a replicant mean for the story? What reason is there for him to be a replicant? It's a cheap gotcha to the audience without cause or meaning. The through-line is very clear if he is human; with him as a replicant, it becomes much less so. It doesn't have the Sixth Sense whoosh of revelation or re-evaluation of the story from a different perspective. You already have the example of Roy's humanity as an inhuman machine in a longer, more brilliant arc. Deckard's is very similar, only much weaker, fainter, and shorter, in that you have a machine (re)discovering its (lack of) humanity. It's just a Twilight Zone twist that means nothing to the narrative.
I'm telling you that a movie is the product of more than one person no matter how much of a control freak the director is. If you want to pretend that Scott did everything then you have to allow that he released a first version of the film that was clearly ambiguous. IMO it makes more sense to admit that a lot of credit for Blade Runner's great story lies with other folks, folks who pretty much all hated the idea of Deckard being a replicant and folks who helped to make sure that the version that we saw was ambiguous at best. Those people are part of the "movie as shot" just as much as Scott.
You also see that with Scott's comments about the film. When the film came out he clearly played up the ambiguous nature of Deckard with comments like, "well wouldn't it be interesting if Deckard was a replicant". It was only later, with new versions of the movie, that he decided to go with this other angle.
No way! All this time I thought the director did everything! Isn't that what the auteur theory is about?
You're missing out on a much better film then. The symbolism of man vs. machine, as someone put it, is not lost in the sense that they both still think that's what's happening. And that's really the more powerful story, since it asks us the more traditional PKD question, what is human?, rather than whether machines are simply stronger than we are.
It's likely they didn't know if he didn't. Neither did Rachel.
To the stylistic question you bring up, I've already provided a response above.
I love this answer. I've always been firmly in the Deckard-is-human camp, partly because it simply never occurred to me that he could be a replicant when I first watched the movie a hundred years ago, and partly because continuing that position so irks Tom. It's fun to bring it up every now and then and watch him shake his head sadly.
Nevertheless, what you say above is quite compelling. Nicely done.
I do find it amusing that folks are poking around in the directorial intent heap. I love listening to the commentary track for the movie Gladiator for a window into Mr. Scott's understanding of his own movies. I firmly believe he has no idea what makes his good movies work and his bad movies not work. Somehow he's just along for the ride. Which is in its own way a measure of genius, I suppose. Still, I love hearing him talk about his movies.
I also love the look Harrison Ford gives at the end of this clip. The way he pronounces the character's name freaks me out, though, as does the reminder that we've only got seven years before this becomes a reality. As a resident of Los Angeles, I find this troubling.
-xtien
"Is this testing whether I'm a replicant or a lesbian, Mr. Deckard?"
Rick Deckard is totally a lesbian.
If nobody knows, how does Gaff know? And if the story is the same since everyone thinks its the same story, because the essential question Dick asks remains the same regardless of Deckard's natural or replicant origins, what is the point of him being a replicant? What purpose does it serve, other than the gotcha moment and draining away from meaning from the narrative?
Yet you said there were "considerable [amounts] of material" that contradict Deckard being a replicant and "large chunks" that don't make sense. You're about as empty-handed as I thought you'd be.
And again, like StGabe, you're missing the fundamental tenet of noire: the detective being corrupted by what he's investigating. It's not a gotcha moment, it's how the genre works.
-Tom
The funny thing about the argument is that there's really no question what the movie is getting at. It takes a very willful kind of obtuseness to not get the point of Blade Runner. I suspect what's going on here, why it's an issue at all, is a mix of 1) people needing plot points underlined, circled, highlighted with a marker, and repeated a few times, and 2) people knowing and loving Blade Runner from the theatrical cut, where the issue isn't even raised.
-Tom
So you're claiming that Deckard becomes a replicant during the course of the movie then?
I don't disagree with your general claim but Deckard being a replicant all along doesn't make it work. The point of the movie is juxtaposing a man's dehumanization against the empathy we begin to feel for the replicants.
Outside of the fact that everyone working on the project but Scott thought that Deckard was a human or that this point was / should be left ambiguous, yes, there's really no question.The funny thing about the argument is that there's really no question what the movie is getting at. It takes a very willful kind of obtuseness to not get the point of Blade Runner. I suspect what's going on here, why it's an issue at all, is a mix of 1) people needing plot points underlined, circled, highlighted with a marker, and repeated a few times, and 2) people knowing and loving Blade Runner from the theatrical cut, where the issue isn't even raised.
Yes, Tom, we got the whole folded unicorn thing. Yes, Tom, we read Scott's comments. No, Tom, the argument still isn't nearly as clear as you think it is. No, we didn't need your pearls of movie wisdom -- we actually knew all that stuff when we started the conversation and still disagree. Was that underlined and circled enough?
Last edited by StGabe; 05-09-2012 at 02:15 PM.
I draw a different conclusion, Tom. I did love the theatrical cut despite its flaws, but I also like the director's cut as well. The problem that exists in my mind is that the original version is pretty clearly showing that the robotic constructs are in many ways more human than their creators, and that Deckard is dehumanized in having to kill them - gunning them down in cold blood at times. Once we find out Deckard is a replicant, what then is the point the movie is making, if the original point is no longer valid? You've said Deckard is corrupted by the replicants - how? In what way is Deckard less pure at the end of the movie? Do you mean that his clarity of mission is gone? I'll buy that, but then he didn't need to be a replicant for that to happen. I don't argue that this is what Scott wanted the movie to say, I just feel that he has lessened the movie somewhat by introducing this aspect.
I tend to agree with Christien that Scott may not fully grasp why his films work, and am reminded that originally the creature at the end of Alien was going to kill Ripley and then radio earth using her voice. Hey, sometimes he ends up making the right call.
Yes45.
And believe you me, Mr. Wheeljack, I can be just as strident arguing that issue as well. :) Seriously, though, Pan's Labyrinth offers a bit more leeway because, you know, magic. But I feel just as strongly that it's an illustration of the difference between subtle (Blade Runner, Take Shelter, The Grey) and ambiguous (Inception, The Fountain, Star Wars*).
-Tom
* Ha ha!
Wait, wait, that's not really what I'm saying. I'm just arguing against rhinohelix and StGabe saying that Deckard being a replicant is a cheap gotcha moment that somehow violates the theme of humanity vs. machinity or whatever. On the contrary, the idea that the detective is investigating something that eventually circles around and implicates himself is a central theme of noire. Don't take the word "corruption" too literally.
And by the way, I have no problem with the original theatrical release. It's a perfectly cromulent movie and I fully understand why people want to cling to it in favor of the director's cut. Blade Runner works on so many levels, and I tend to agree with the studio that it doesn't necessarily need such a dark ending to be a good movie. Sometimes you can just slap a world-weary voiceover onto a movie and -- voila! -- it's plenty noire enough!
-Tom
So it makes perfect sense to send a replicant to Voight Kampf another "experimental" replicant with memory implants? That the police would use a replicant, so illegal on Earth that their very presence required their "retirement", to hunt other replicants? That Bryant would treat Deckard like an old friend, whose "magic" he needed? That Tyrell wouldn't make mention or notice in any way this replicant so far exceeding his other creations that it could tell when another replicant fell short and then wonder how it didn't know what it was? That Rachel, whose very existence was portrayed as redefining the rules between replicants and humans and was treated as special, was in fact the lesser of the two with Deckard?
There is no explanation of the above based upon what is presented in the film.
As to the point of noire's corruption, I would agree; I think that journey is complete when Deckard tells Gaff he's "finished". He means that on multiple levels, in that there are no more replicants from this incident to be "retired"; more importantly, that he has seen the essential humanity of the replicants through his encounters with them and won't be doing any more killing as a Blade Runner, at least in my interpretation.
Myself, I prefer Rachel as the unicorn based upon her "uniqueness", in both Deckard's vision and Gaff's origami. And while I am unrepentant in my typical preference for upbeat, or at least not downer for downer's sake endings, I prefer the DC/FC ending to the theatrical release.
It's "cheap" in the sense it serves no purpose in the story. It's a twist for twist's sake. It also weakens the story, and opens a bunch of questions the film makes no effort to answer.
Last edited by rhinohelix; 05-09-2012 at 02:50 PM.
Both screenwriters and the original author liked the human version better and Scott went with Deckard as a replicant because it was "Heavy Metal." Let's not try too hard here. ;-)
"You know that Voight-Kampff test of yours. Did you ever take that test yourself?"
What has the detective being corrupted by what he is investigating have to do with whether Deckard is a replicant or not? That tenet would be (and is) upheld either way with Ford's performance and Deckard's actions. Leaving the question unanswered (or at least open to interpretation) would be exactly as true to whatever noire (or hardboiled) tenets you, or rather Ridley Scott, subscribe to. The circle and implication of the detective you mention in your reply to Pogue Mahone is already present - the assassin finds a target that he doesn't want to kill, because he has fallen in love with her. Again, there is no need for Blade Runner to reveal whether Deckard is a replicant or not.
I just ordered the Final Cut to see for myself but I am taking your word for it, that it is presented in a way that removes all doubt about Deckard. I'm just astounded that Scott would do that, because there are a lot of things in the earlier versions that has you believe he might not be. As rhinohelix points out. But you're never really sure and I would absolutely have preferred for it to stay that way.
(John Carpenter presents The Thing - The Final Cut. Childs is found alone at the base, with no sign of Macready, and is taken to Argentina where he is revealed to be completely human. The End.)
Excuse me? Did you just say that the point of Blade Runner is that Deckard is a replicant?
Last edited by Hammet; 05-09-2012 at 04:02 PM.
I did. Should I have put it in spoiler tags? :)
But, yes, the final reveal, the ultimate mystery, the resolution, the self-discovery, the narrative arc, call it what you will. Just as the point of Chinatown is that Jack Nicholson ends up back in Chinatown, the point of Blade Runner -- at least as the movie was shot and eventually restored to in the director's cut -- is that Deckard is a replicant.
-Tom
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