Blade Runner

So I read Do Android Dream of Electric Sheep on Wedesnday, and I really feel, now more than before, that Blade Runner is a pretty lousy film.

Blade Runner pretty much saps all the really interesting psychology and philosophy out of the book and replaces it with a psuedo-intellectual action movie with androids that want to live longer.

The primary question at the heart of the book is what does it mean to be human?

Deckard's replicant hunting is just a backdrop for that question, and I don't get that at all from the film.

have you seen the director's cut? it gets into that stuff a little more. it doesn't come anywhere close to 'androids' but, it is better.

you also have to look at the context of the period bladerunner was made. it was just after quite possibly the first blockbuster film, star wars. so, it had a lot of pressure to be another extremely popular sci-fi film.

despite all of that, i like to think of bladerunner and androids as two separate stories, even though the movie was based on that book. if you look at it that way, it's much better.

I realize there was pressure for a popular Sci-Fi movie, but Blade Runner is not that.

It's full of lots of dark and atmosphereic scenery. It has a very slow pace. And to be quite frank, it's slightly pretentious.

I could've understood and looked over it if it was made for pop appeal, but it was clearly intended to be somewhat thoughtful/art-house style. Given what it was trying to express, it seems like Dick's book was a poor choice as to source material.

And yes. I've only seen the director's cut. I haven't seen the original.

I would never ask for a literal translation.

The best that I would ever hope is that the spirit of the book be translated to the screen. I feel that Peter Jackson accomplished this with the first two LotR movies. Very well in fact.

I've never been fond of Ridley Scott as a director.

The only movie of his that I'm very fond of is Alien.

My point is that the book and the movie are about two totally different things. The movie essentially only borrows characters from the book and uses them to its own devices.

Nowhere is the flexibile definition of reality that invades all of Dick's books even moderately present.

That's my complaint.

The book is only about 240 pages long.

Definetly worth the time investment.

Yeah the movie and book really are two different things. I don't think I'd have even known they were the same story if the phrases like "Replicant" hadn't been the same in both. So many things from the book were either just briefly touched on or completely eliminated, like the artificial animals, the mood machine, and the Replicant police station. The only director I can think of capable of making a movie with a Philip K. Dick feel is David Lynch.

Funny story about the godawful voiceover from the non-director's cut. When the movie was finished the studio execs thought it was too confusing, so they wanted a voiceover added. In the words of Harrison Ford, "I figured that if I did it badly enough they wouldn't use it." And the moral of the story is never underestimate the stupidity of a studio exec.

Shhhhhh....Skinjob might hear you!
She loves this story so much she's in the process of devoting half of her left arm to its images. I loves me some Skinny.

Because I don't own the rights to adapt the book, and I don't have the money to pay for the rights which undoubtedly are astronomical given the success of Phillip K. Dick adapted movies (Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report).

That and I don't know thing one about screenwriting.

Anyway. I don't particular adhere to the "Could you do better? Then do it or shove it" school of thought.

It is one of my favorite films of all time. I wish I had a place like Sebastian's with all the dolls and stuff. Way cool man... way cool.

-x

Amen.

Probably a good thing too. In a world where everyone felt that way, no one would be able to point it out when a pro athlete royally screwed up. I mean as in blowing the game, not like getting busted by the cops while doing blow and getting blown by an underage hooker.

I know that I could get busted by the cops while snacking on some nose candy whilst getting a hummer from a Brownie better than any professional athlete aside from Steve Howe, Darryl Strawberry, and Dave Parker. No question.

I love DebraJean.
I'm not gonna get into it, because if you don't like it, nothing I say is going to convince you to like it. I haven't read the book, and to be frank, I don't want to, because I love the movie so much.
And I don't think that a movie always has to be 100% equal to the book to be a great movie. Witness The Last of the Mohicans, which is totally different from the book, but still a very good film.
Having studied film, I've gotten much more forgiving of writers and directors changing things for the screen. If you're the type of person who's going to nitpick and say "This wasn't in the book!" then I suggest you don't bother with the films, because they're never going to be exact.

I don't want you to convince me to like Blade Runner. I know there are nice things about the film. It's beautifuly shot. There's some good acting. Even the dialogue isn't really worth complaining about.

I'm perfectly ok with writers and directors changing things for the screen. I have actually posted this. I think it's a crime to try to do a literal translation. Just look at the Harry Potter movies. The parts are all there, but they don't quite add up to a whole. Why? Because Christopher Columbus was going for a by-the-book translation.

What I advocate is trying to capture the spirit or essence of a book and to translate it's general message to the screen.

Peter Jackson and the LotR movies are excellent examples of this. Jackson fiddled with the details, but the overall idea, an epic struggle between good and evil, is still there. I'd say that Jackson has probably even done a *better* job at telling that story than Tolkein, who often got bogged down in fleshing out the details of the very elaborate world that he had created.

Also, for the record... I saw Blade Runner before I had ever read Do Andorid Dream of Electric Sheep?, and I wasn't all that fond of it then either.

Anyway. If nothing else, this thread has actually convinced multiple people to go out and read a very good book, so it can't be a total waste.

i love the book, but i *love* the movie. what can i say? apples and oranges. if you're not a fan of ridley scott's, though, i think that probably has a lot to do with it. man, so many great parts of that movie, but the scene with rutger hauer and harrison ford on the rooftop at the end is worth the price of admission all by itself. two different animals.

but i agree, definitely worth it if some of the good people here discover dick's work. it's always kind of baffled me just a little that dick's books have made so many, at least, decent movies. his books as you read them don't scream "translatable". at least they don't to me.

i want to see more, and more literal, translations of heinlein's books. friday, stranger in a strange land, and any/all of the lazarus long books to start.

wanna' talk about books that get completely lost in the translation, much as i liked starship trooppers, and i did, that movie should have been called something else so they could then go back and do a proper movie, truly based on the book, but that's a whole 'nother rant…

peace!

Blade Runner just came on T.V.

I enjoy the movie, but I never got why it is as popular as it is. But there are much worse Philip K Dick adaptations out there. I'm looking at you A Scanner Darkly.

What a maroon!

Deckard: You're reading a magazine. You come across a full-page nude photo of a girl.
Rachael: Is this testing whether I'm a replicant or a lesbian, Mr. Deckard?



Ahhhh, levity.