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Well, thanks for making thing more clear, Charles.

But frankly said, the color scheme of Sam's snapshots is not far from what I can see on my monitor, so I don't think he would deserve the blame. More people independently reported similar disappointment with the new color scheme and that much of the lovely matte detail later in the film has been put into shadow and lost. I have played a lot with saturation/brightness/contrast to find the optimal setting for the FC, with moderate success, but it was never without a compromise - the picture in some scenes looked better, in some worse. Perhaps Ridley thought the hand painting is to obvious and doesn't look good anymore, who knows. Of course, the director has full right to edit his baby as he wants to, but then it's not unnatural if people have hard time getting used to changes such as significantly (and not evenly) altered color scheme.
Not that the picture looks bad, not at all. But for me personally the green/blue tint makes BR closer to much more recent sci-fi films (such as Matrix or Minority Report), while that brown/grey tint of previous BR versions, somehow made impression of true 'vintage', or say 'old school' feeling for me. I think for people who are new to Blade Runner, this would be entirely new, if not redundant issue, and I guess they will love FC immediately and wholeheartedly.

But it's excellent that previous versions were reissued for archival purposes in expanded editions. Many thanks for that!

It's strange, because once the first frame grabs started coming out, even I was taken aback by how green they appeared. So we checked with Warners and the authoring facility, and then looked at it again on the big screen and on properly calibrated monitors and it didn't look that green or "blue steel" at all. In fact, every time I see The Final Cut on the big screen, I pay special attention to Holden VKing Leon, because those frame grabs were ridiculously green. And sure enough, each and every time, it looks exactly how it's supposed to look, and nowhere near that green at all.

But again, this is the first time Ridley's had total control over Blade Runner. That just doesn't go for the cut, or the digital fixes, or the sound...it also goes for the color-timing. So, to me, all of these comparison to past versions don't make a whole lot of sense since he didn't have total control over those past versions. And believe me, I was almost slavishly against any form of revisionism or modernization of the film. I never once heard Ridley or anyone say, "Let's make it more contemporary." It was always, "This is the way it was supposed to look."

I guess it wouldn't be Blade Runner without at least a little controversy.

Heh, you're right about that. Thanks again for commenting.

I can't wait to see it in a theatre now. Unfortunately I missed the fall screenings in London, which would have been my closest chance.

Any possibility that we might be able to squeeze some additional information out of you re: the thought process behind the Final Cut? As evidenced by my review, I'm particularly interested in the thoughts that went into adapting the "foreshadowing" inserts of Roy and retaining the two different versions of Leon's "Tell you about my mother" line...

Read some related discussion here.

Unfortunately I live in country which has no limited projections of the film
and I guess many other fans in the world will have to live only with home video experience of their film. Well, at least I could see DC three times in cinema. Even if the copy was scratched, big screen is big screen.



Yep, but then it’s also controversy what makes cult films immortal.

Oh, btw Charles, just recently I purchased Alien Quadrilogy set, you did wonderful job on the documentaries and stuff. It took me a month to get through all the material on those 9 DVDs, it’s totally exhausting (in a good way!). A well deserved prize for you!

Well, those two shots still foreshadow what's to come. The close-up on Roy's hand has barely been changed -- We just had Imageworks add a little abstract neon reflection to the frame. As for the close-up on Roy's face, we had to remove Tyrell's thumb anyway, and since it was always a case of stealing shots and not intentional foreshadowing, Ridley wanted it to be more smoothly integrated into the film, which it now is. But the framing and action within the shot is virtually the same, so on perhaps a slightly more subconscious level, it still harkens forward.



I think I might have discussed this one in another thread, but basically, I tried matching the two lines, but doing so kind of ruined whichever of the two moments were changed. If you use the harder "I'll tell you about my mother!" in the first scene, it telegraphs to the audience that Leon is about to act and diminishes the surprise of the gunshot. Plus, Brion James' performance is so mellow at that point, it would look like a bad foreign dub to use the other line. If you use the softer "Lemme tell you about my mother..." during Deckard's playback in his sedan, it ruins the build-up to the gunshot echoing in the tunnel, now that we already know Holden's fate. Of the two, I found the latter change to be the least offensive, but again, this falls under what I would call the Greedo Rule*, which is that if Ridley had wanted the lines to match back in 1982, he easily could have. It was a deliberate choice. And changing it would have undermined the film's reliance on false or implanted memories as a theme.

* By the way, in the final stages of polishing The Final Cut, a lot of very minor last minute tweaks were made as Ridley was working with the colorists. So there might be some tiny changes that break that rule, but none of the big fixes could have been done in 1982, especially given the difficult circumstances surrounding the making of Blade Runner.



Thank you kindly!

You, my friend, understand... and that is why we love you!

Yes, that all makes a lot of sense. As I've mentioned, I think the elision between the two versions of Leon's line is a great subliminal detail.

Thanks for giving us this peek behind the scenes!

HAN SHOOT FIRST! I've seen it, I swear!

Which version of the film is on the 2nd pictures on the previous page?

I.e. the bright colours version, I like to have than version just in my collection it looks nice.

Re-read the first post.

I did, it is the 2006 Limited edition Remastered Directors cut.

I had to do screencap comparisons, but apparently it is also on the 5 DVD Final cut set. The 1992 Directors cut on disc 3 of the final cut is apparently not the 1992 transfer, but it is the 2006 remastered version.

So if you want this bright colors version of Blade Runner you don't need to go hunting for the Limited edition 2006 Directors cut release.

Hello, new member here! Just wanted to add my two cents...

I'm rewatching the Final Cut (because oddly enough, I still haven't listened to the art/special effects dept. commentary) and so far I haven't really noticed that big a difference. The neons are not quite as saturated. A little darker, maybe. But I have to agree that watching it in motion is different than seeing screencaps, same as with video games. Screencaps are nice, but they don't give you the whole thing in context.

Want to see some seriously bad colour timing? Look at the Star Wars Trilogy DVDs...