BladeZone's Off World Forums

After watching the 'Deleted Cut' from the 5th disc in the anniversary set, I have been becoming very fond of the hospital scenes. At first I thought they were kind of cheesy, or at least the low resolution version of the 'first visit' to Holden by Deckard.

Together though they really add a lot to Deckard as a character as well as tap into the motivations of the replicants better than the Voice Over ever did. I think if they were left in the movie they would have added a lot, and in truth, they don't seem to be much more cheesy than other parts of the movie that I had already become accustomed to.

I really wish Ridley had not been so afraid of the "Lucas Effect" and decided to put those scenes back in the movie. I think it would have added enough to the narrative of the movie that it would have made it more acceptable and digestible in it's time.

Andy

I don't agree. The acting in this scene is not quite up to snuff with the rest of the film. Although I do like Gaff getting a little more screen-time, especially his little quip "I spit on metaphysics, sir.".

Maybe the scene could be cleverly cut together so as to get right to the point of the scene, where Holden muses about Replicants becoming human and harder to detect. However the point of this scene spells out heavy handedly what is already there to discover within the film.

I used to think the same thing, but after repeated watchings the acting started to work for me. It just adds so much of what the film is lacking with showing motivations of each of the characters.

I think some over dubbing on Holden's voice which sounded a bit weird, might have helped it our more too. I also think it would have given a reward to the viewers that might have caught on to some of the stuff by confirming their suspicions of the Replicants motives. For the more passive viewers it would have given them a sense of plot focus which is so subtle in the movie, almost everybody misses it the first time around.

I admit it doesn't seem to match the tone of the rest of the movie, but I feel if it was in there to begin with the tones would have blended together.

Andy

The second deleted hospital scene is one of my favorite deleted bits from the film; it has two edits in it that I love, the first being the initial shot of Deckard sitting next to Holden, and the phase from Holden's face to the monitor in Bryant's "blue room."

I'm glad that non of the deleted scenes made it into the Final Cut. However, the alternate 'Ride Into The Sunset' scene would be an interesting choice to replace the TC's ending. This alternate scene is a lot more suggestive than the scene they used.

Watching the hospital scenes isolated makes them look pretty awful. Before I saw the BR 2008 fan edit, I'd have whole-heartedly agreed they didn't belong in the film. But after seeing the fan edit, I've changed my viewpoint 180 degrees. They're essential to the film.

Doc

Exactly!

I'm curious, how are they essential?

They show real character development for Deckard, as well as Bryant and Gaff. It also touches on the real story and motivations of the replicants. I think all those people that say they "didn't get it", would "get it" a lot better if this was still in the film. This fills in a lot of the blanks that usually take multiple viewings to put together in the film.

Andy

And I even think "multiple viewings" wouldn't do the job except for fans like OW Forum people intimately acquainted with the movie and its variants, both on film and in screenplay variants. The general public would never get it.

Deckard coldly gives Holden a hard time about things like who his plumber is. Holden is sitting in a tank, immobile, reading Robert Lewis Stevenson to escape from his pain. It's a very moving scene as Deckard tries to distance himself from the horrors of what waits in store for him, at the moment his reflexes or intellect fail because of age or that instant of delay caused by conscious or a sense of morality.

Doc

I think blanks are a good thing. I think multiple viewings are a good thing. Trying to spoon feed the audience is exactly what got Blade Runner into trouble in the first place by way of the voice over. I find the film to be an endlessly fascinating puzzle. To hand over a cheat sheet for solving that puzzle immediately diminishes its greatness, in my opinion. I wonder how short the film's afterlife would have been if it left you with no questions as you were leaving the theater.

Right on.

This baffles and vexes me. The film's afterlife, as we all know, was unusually fascinating. Blade Runner had built up an pretty large fanbase during the '80s. It inspired all kinds of artists, influenced MTV, the video game media and cinema in general. I don't think there's another film with a more successful afterlife than Blade Runner. And if I may speak frankly, I think that the fans and the artists got a whole lot more out of this film than the information given by the voiceover. The strength of Blade Runner lies not in the plot but in the layers beneath it. For the fans who loved this film from the get-go, the narration was mainly an atmospherical Film Noir device and not a clarifying instrument.

Even the Fan Edit doesn't solve all the mysteries.

We're still left with far more questions than answers, which is the nature of any good work of fiction. Why? Because good fiction holds a mirror up to us, makes commonly shared values something personally experienced. It forces us to question who we are... why we do it... how we measure up in the few days we're allowed to walk the planet. To see the film as a puzzle to be solved it to see it on its most superficial level. I'm a shitty philosopher, but years ago, I wrote something when I made one of many attempts to face stuff like that, after a binge of reading DADOES, watching the movie, and knocking back a third of a bottle of Balvenie Portwood (in my dottage, I now drink more than think-- it's easier). Anyway I made sort of an attempt to articulate and synthesize all the hope and horror of Philip K. Dick's work, and Ridley Scott's palimpset, and damn good Scotch. If Sara Campbell had still been alive, I'd probably have submitted it to Cityspeak. But then, as Robert Heinlein once quipped, people who read their own poetry in public probably have other nasty habits.

MEMORY

There is always night above the roiling sky,
but seldom do we look so far as that.

Instead, we watch as birds form patterns
dark in varying degrees,
while lofted on the fingertips
of God's indifferent hand.

Sometimes we find ourselves in such a moment,
more or less than we might wish to be,
but an ineluctable part of it;
knowing that in the instant memory begins.

And every step remaining in the journey
becomes a step away,
from,
where now,
we stand.

--------------------

Catch ya later, fast traveler.

Doc

I am one of those people that did not really like this movie the first time I saw it. I think it was at a later time that I was watching the movie late at night with no money invested in a ticket or rental that I just sat and absorbed, and got lost in the visuals instead of trying to follow the story, that is when I first got hooked.

In the meantime I have changed my mind about the plot a million times, especially about Deckard's origin. I did like the enigmatic aspect of what I perceived as hidden symbolism and clues. It certainly made come back even more times than I would have otherwise, even given how much I had been in love with the visuals of the film.

My problem in the end is the film tries to tell a simple story that hints at a much larger story, much in the way parts of our lives can tell a little bit about the much bigger story of the rest of the world, but the simple story itself seems incomplete. Deckard's character is a great one, and regardless if he is a replicant or a man that behaves like one, I think we need a little bit more about him to even care about him.

Ironically I think I cared less and less about him as I watched the movie more and more. Early on I could relate to his pain and feeling like a pawn in other peoples world. As I was in my 20's this was in perfect pitch to how I felt. Still I always felt something else was missing.

I noticed this the most when I would watch the movie with others and they would ask "Why Why Why?" about his character especially, as well as "what exactly were the replicants?". I often would feel their disappointment with the film at that time.

In the end I filled in those blanks from my own imagination, the novel, and from talking to others about it, instead of with anything from within the movie itself. When I finally saw the second hospital scene it confirmed everything I had been thinking. It would have been a great mid-film payoff that rewarded those that were thinking beyond the surface of what was being shown, and for those that weren't, it would have got them caught up to speed so they weren't still stuck at the beginning of the film trying to figure it out.

Best of all it still would have left a lot of questions about Tyrell and the Replicants, and would not have answered the "Deck a rep" question. Still allowing for 25+ years worth of fan speculation and discussion. It might have even made the film profitable back in 82.

Just my naive take on it anyway
Andy

p.s. cool poem Doc, I liked it.