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| Harrison Ford as Rick Deckard in 'Blade Runner' |
Science fiction does not have to be fantastical. Too often,
if a sci-fi film can inspire us to a better understanding of our current
condition, fiction can give way to fact. To this end, Ridley Scott’s
masterpiece, ‘Blade Runner’ (1982), serves as a prime example.
The life story of the ‘Blade Runner’ film is an inspiring one.
The first film ever to be adapted from a novel by Philip K. Dick - namely ‘Do
Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?’, ‘Blade Runner’ was released in the summer
of 1982. This initial reactions to the film were mixed, because many audience
found the story too slow (some jokingly referenced it as ‘Blade Crawler’), and
um – boring. It shouldn’t be too surprising – the star, Harrison Ford, the one
who has starred as Han Solo and Indiana Jones, and given the fact that he is
melancholically holding a revolver in the poster, one will likely to expect a
John Woo-style heroic bloodshed. Yet, a small number of critics and film buffs
could be able to look beyond the obvious, and started to appreciate the
artistic aspects and implications of this ‘boring film’. Indeed, ‘Blade Runner’
is a film that rewards repeated viewings, as there are so many insights and
details that you cannot get it all in one screening. By the 1990s, Blade Runner
has already been re-evaluated and it is now hailed as the one of the greatest
sci-fi films in the history of cinema. The film features in many of the Top
Sci-Fi movie lists, and it is acclaimed as one of the most realistic science
fiction films ever, rather than like the sort of Mary Poppins fantasy that no
one can easily believe in.
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| Deckard and Rachael |
How to retire skin-jobs? (Spoilers head, but that’s worth
it.)
The story of Blade Runner takes place in 2019. By that time,
humans have already developed genetic engineering techniques to create
‘replicants’, a sort of ‘super-human’ that has strong power and intelligence,
yet with a limited life span of 4 years. Known as ‘skin jobs’ in a colloquial
way, these replicants are used by humans as slaves, to work in hardship at the
off-world colonies that humans have already abandoned. Since the replicants are
not allowed to interact or intrude the human world, special cops, known as
‘Blade Runners’, are employed to track down and kill any intruding replicants
on Earth – they prefer the word ‘retire’ to ‘kill’. Since replicants look like
humans, the police force has developed an empathy test – known as a
Voight-Kampff test, to distinguish these ‘super-men’.
Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is a blade runner who is
assigned to ‘retire’ 4 replicants. The quartet has escaped from the off-world
and now they are drifting on Earth. The leader is Roy Batty, and the other
members are Leon, Pris and Zhora. As Deckard comes to investigate, he goes to
the compound of Dr. Eldon Tyrell, the head of a corporation who develops the replicant
technology. There he meets a young lady called Rachael (Sean Young), an
assistant of Tyrell. Tyrell challenges Deckard whether one can distinguish a
replicant from a human by the Voight-Kampff Test, and thus they decide to test
on Rachael. As the result surprisingly turns out, Rachael is a replicant, yet
Tyrell assures Deckard that she is not aware of this truth. When Deckard goes
home later, he is stalked by Rachael, who is now depressed and not willing to
believe all her memories are merely ‘implants’. Deckard offers solace to her
and they begin a relationship. On the other hand, the replicants Roy and Leon
are looking for clues to track down their creator, as they just want nothing
more than an extension of their limited
lifespan. The pleasure model, Pris, comes across an automaton-loving man, J.F.
Sebastein, and they become friends. J.F. turns out to be a key designer for
Tyrell, so when he meets Roy ,
he tells the replicants about Tyrell’s compound.
Deckard starts to gather evidence that Zhora is working as a
dancer in the night club area, so he goes there and attempts to trap her into
custody. Zhora is intelligent enough to sense that, after a brief struggle,
they start chasing through the streets. Zhora is eventually gunned down by
Deckard. He is then ambushed by Leon ,
and as Leon is ready to
‘wake him up’ and kill him, Rachael suddenly appears and guns down Leon instead! Rachael
and Deckard retreat to his flat, and Deckard assures her that he will not
retire her, though he is assigned to sooner or later. Further romance ensues.
Meanwhile, Roy goes to confront Tyrell, and when
Roy insists ‘I
want more life, father / fxxker!’, Tyrell points out that, Roy is like a
candle, for which it burns twice as bright, the flame goes out half the time
shorter. Roy
doesn’t care, and simply crushes Tyrell’s head.
Deckard is out for action again, and he eventually goes to
J.F.’s house. Pris, who is posing as a doll among the automatons, launches a
spectacular acrobatic attack on Deckard. In the nick of second, Deckard puts 2
bullets into her body, killing her instantly. Roy arrives and the he starts a final
showdown with Deckard. Yet the brawl is certainly one-sided – Roy , a replicant with magnificent caliber, is
able to wound and chase Deckard through the mansion, with Deckard too thrilled
to fight back. Eventually, Deckard is hanging on the edge of the building, soon
to fall down to his demise. It is at this point that Roy offers him a hand and saves him.
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| Deckard on the edge |
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 Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.
When Roy is finished with it, he dies. Deckard comes back to the apartment to unite with Rachael. Rachael turns out to be a special replicant model that has a far longer lifespan. But before they leave, Deckard discovers a unicorn origami, likely to be left by his colleague, Gaff. The unicorn is something that appears in Deckard’s earlier daydream. That may suggest his dreams are ‘engineered’ and thus Deckard, himself, is also a replicant. Alarmed, he takes Rachael to the elevator, and the doors close...
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| 'Move, get out of the way!' Deckard in hot pursuit. |
Man’s Match?
What are the ‘skin jobs’ that Deckard has to take down?
How can these strong fellas shed light on our understanding of humanity? To me,
replicants are truly fascinating, as they are transcending the possible
experiences of the human beings, and certainty can be seen as an example of
post-humanism. Yet, the replicants are not quite the same as our friends, the
Terminators!
First, it is evident that the replicants do have a
consciousness. They certainly possess cognitive abilities. As Pris succinctly
stated to J.F. Sebastein, ‘I think, Sebastein, therefore I am.’ This is the
ultimate Cartesian stance, and Pris uses this argument to defend her ‘being’,
to assert her wholesome existence. Pris is assertive enough for this
epistemological certainty, yet in other cases, such as that of Deckard’s
situation (see later), can he be that confident? How do Pris know that she is
not dreaming, not living in a tin-can, or not controlled like a Duracell as in
‘The Matrix’? The epistemological implications here can be profound, and Pris
can only safely assume that she is a thinking replicant, quite capable of doing
impressive leg-locks. In a sense, they
are also designed to possess higher intellectual abilities, to serve the proposes
for uses by humans.
What is quite fascinating is that replicants show
compassion, and genuinely care about, at least, their other replicant friends. Roy cares about Pris, and even the rather dumb Leon treasures
Zhora’s compassion. They band as a group and see each other as friends. This is
an attribute very different from other cyborgs, and I guess the implication
here is quite ironic as it serves as a reaction against the cold, insensitive
human beings, which is what Deckard’s divorced wife would have coined, ‘sushi’,
or ‘cold fish’. It is the emotional capabilities exhibited by these ‘low-level
human-like androids’ that makes the dehumanized and uncompassionate humans
rather disturbing to watch. Also, I feel that it is an ironic answer to the
atmosphere set by the crime and film-noir films in the past, in which the edgy,
underdog protagonists often can not place any trust on people around them.
I suppose the ultimate difference between humans and
replicants is not a scientific one, but a social one. It is the motivation
behind the creation of replicants. The intention, is single-minded, to create
workhorses to serve human’s purposes. It is a master-slave dialectic here, no
wonder the emotional replicants show hatred and contempt for their masters. They
have to be subservient to their human bosses, but their bosses simply do not
provide human dignity to them. They are seen as slaves, and that is the reason I
think Roy and
his friends should not really be seen as villains – they just have a desire to
ask for a longer life, to at least live more like a human...
Even if the humans fabricate to make the replicants sound
inferior, it is their courage that makes them stand out. A scene that is
extremely moving to me is of course the ‘Tears In Rain’ scene, when Roy is about to die. Roy somehow is capable of
being compassionate, and he deeply understands the plight of human nature. Roy , with his experiences
in the on-world and off-world, has lived his replicant life to the fullest, though
with a span of no more than 4 years. He has seen far more than his so-called
master, the humans. He is even melancholic
about the fact that these memories will be lost, and laments the sadness with
tears. He is a replicant who is able to experience, and to feel and explore. If
there is a super-human ability in replicants, that is it. As Newton has once said, ‘If I have seen further than others, it is by
standing upon the shoulders of giants.’ If this is really how things work, then
Deckard should be inspired by Roy Batty.
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| Now it's his problem? |
It’s not Deckard’s problem
All in all, replicants are some sort of ‘super-man’, or in
Nietzsche’s characterization, an ‘Übermensch’. Man has certainly made his match
– the replicant, but it is in no way Rick Deckard’s problem. It is you, whether
you are ready to take action and go one step further!
(to be continued)
by Ed Law
4/10/2017
Film Analysis
