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Saturday, September 1, 2018

Voight-Kampff

Films: Blade Runner 2049
Format: DVD from Cortland Community Library on rockin’ flatscreen.

I was initially interested to see Blade Runner 2049 as a continuation of a sort of the original film. The original film is set in 2019, so this would be the same universe thirty years on. The first film was one of those that became important and influential over time. The original theatrical release was pretty substandard and completely eclipsed by E.T. released in the same month. Now it’s a genuine classic and a film that is absolutely required viewing. The sequel could be the same. And then I got a look at the running time.

Seriously? 164 minutes? Even with the most generous credit sequence I could imagine, that’s a good 30 minutes longer than I expected.

I’ll make plot run-through as quick as possible here. Blade Runner 2049 is a continuation of the universe in question, but not specifically of the same characters. Oh, Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is going to show up eventually, but for the most part, this is going to be an entirely new set of characters. As the story begins, we learn that the Tyrell Corporation went under because of the continued problem with replicants—artificial humans. Later models didn’t have the programmed short life span, which made them even more dangerous than the more standard replicants. The company went under, but came back with new technology that made the new replicants more tractable.

We’re going to spend most of the movie with one of those new, more tractable replicants, K (Ryan Gosling). It seems that there are still older model replicants out in the world hiding among humanity. Newer models like K are sent out to “retire” them. K is sent to investigate someone called Sapper Morton (Dave Bautista), and a fight ensues that ends with Sapper Morton being killed. On his way back home, K discovers something buried under a dead tree.

What’s buried turns out to be a skeleton in a box. That skeleton, it is determined, died during childbirth. Much more important is that the woman in question has serial numbers in her bones—she was a replicant, and thus allegedly incapable of reproduction. A little detective work and we learn that the skeleton belonged to Rachel from the first film, thus implying that the father might well be Rick Deckard. K’s boss Lt. Joshi (Robin Wright) wants him to track down the child and retire it, since the idea that replicants can reproduce might well start a revolution. At the same time the new owner of Tyrell, Niander Wallace (Jared Leto) wants to child and sends his replicate assistant/assassin Luv (Sylvia Hoeks) to track down the child as well. K’s path will lead him through his own past, a memory creator named Dr. Ana Stelline (Carla Juri), and to a group of replicants lead by a woman named Freysa (Hiam Abbass). And in all of this, K is assisted by his virtual girlfriend Joi (Ana de Armas).

So here’s the thing: I was right to be wary of this based on the running time. While there is a lot here, it feels like this could stand a good trimming down to be something much more reasonable in length. There’s no reason his needed to be longer than 135 minutes, and 120 is probably closer to the ideal running time for this story.

One thing that does work for me, at least on paper, is the change in genre. Oh, don’t get me wrong--Blade Runner 2049 is very much a science fiction film, but beyond that, it’s a completely different movie. The original is very much a film noir in a lot of respects. Blade Runner 2049 is really not. There’s a mystery here to be solved, but it’s much more of a standard mystery movie than it is a modernized entry into the noir style.

As such, it’s not bad, but it’s also not great, and a big part of that is the ridiculous running time. It also manages to give up on a lot of the spectacular visuals that made Blade Runner such a classic. There are still some that work, but frequently we’re given blasted landscapes with little or nothing on the horizon. I’m not saying that the film isn’t filmed well; It was nice to see Roger Deakins finally win an Oscar for this.

But a lot of the world building is gone. One of the reasons Blade Runner remained so vibrant and important as a film is that it feels like it takes place in a fully-realized world. This sequel gets rid of a great deal of that in favor of, well, story and details. Losing the world building for the sake of a mystery seems like a poor trade, and that right there is going to be how I tend to remember Blade Runner 2047.

Why to watch Blade Runner 2049The original is one of the greats of the genre.
Why not to watch: 164 minutes?! Really?!

10 comments:

  1. I watched 2049 on an overnight flight and somehow that worked very well for me. On a plane you just want to pass time. I think 2049 hit the right ambience and thematically it followed the first one well enogh. Still I cannot help thinking it was missing something. I doubt this will be the same classic the first one is.

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    1. I agree. That's partly the function of being a sequel, I think. The original created a vision of a future world. This one doesn't, and doesn't really build on the vision from the first film.

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  2. True enough, BR2049 only slightly expands on the Blade Runner world, and maybe not enough. There are new locations and new characters, yet a lot of the themes and technology you can already find in the original. The sequel isn't confident if wants to be blockbuster or arthouse film and is this strange hybrid trying to please both crowds. Gosling is dull as the lead and the long running time accentuated that. BR2049 looks ambitious, and the abandoned hotel sequence impressed me visually, but when I examine the movie closely it's playing it way too safe. I might have liked it better if Vangelis had returned to do the music. Nice to catch up with Deckard again but not a sequel I'm anxious to rewatch any time soon.

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    1. That's right about my take on it. This could have easily built on a visionary film, and instead...didn't. Sure, it would have been a risk, but a very calculated one in a film that had a guaranteed audience.

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  3. I'm such a big fan of the original film (and by "original," I mean one of the director's cuts, not the original release version) that I had to see Blade Runner 2049, running time be danged! I saw it in the theater and I liked it well enough. I was never bored. It didn't feel too long in the theater.

    But even though I was never bored, I was never particularly moved either.

    I was very surprised when it turned up on the additions to the List. I knew my favorite genre film for 2017 (Atomic Blonde) was a long shot but I thought Wonder Woman was a shoo-in.

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    1. I'd much rather have had Atomic Blonde here. Or Logan.

      Not bored, but not moved sounds about right.

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  4. This film was missing the one thing that made the original so great, an antagonist as superb as Rutger Hauer's portrayal of Roy Batty. Hell, Rutger can tell you better than I can: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/rutger-hauer-blade-runner-2049-why-films-today-lack-balls-1085827 Damn, now I have to watch "Blind Fury" and "The Hitcher" again. as I usually watch "Ladyhawke" every time I visit my mom.

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    1. Hauer is right. It's my opinion (one you can find in places on this blog over the last nine years) that most great science fiction is about the question of what it means to be human. You can suggest that Blade Runner 2049 asks that question, but it asks it in in the most pedestrian way possible--is something that was given birth to a human? What a boring way to come at this question!

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  5. Replies
    1. We do indeed. If we agreed on all things, one of us would be redundant.

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