Fisher - Blade Runner 1991 vs. 1982

Although I am admittedly still not the hugest fan of the Blade Runner movies, I did prefer Ridley Scott’s directorial cut over the theatrical 1982 release. The most notable differences between the two films were the removal of Harrison Ford’s voice over and the cut of the escapade ending in the 1991 version. 

Without the voice over, the film did move at a slower pace, with many moments of drawn out, silent pauses between points of highly heated action. However, the lack of added commentary provided these scenes with a calm intensity as viewers stretch to discern how Rick must feel and compare his ideas with their own feelings of the strange world he lives in. I will say that Ridley Scott did choose to stretch out some of these periods for too long, almost to the point that thy were on the verge than the of being rendered meaningless, but overall I think the effect was to make the film more of a think piece theatrical cut. 

This theme of creating a thought-provoking environment for the reader is reinforced by the open-ended conclusion to the director’s cut. By not handing audiences a happy conclusion that clears up any doubts about the future of Rick and Rachel’s relationship, the unresolved ending leaves people wondering how Rick and Rachel will make things work. It invites questions into the nature of the lovers’ relationship, from its questionable beginning to the two’s fundamental physical differences to whether or not Rachel will even live long enough for any major disparities to occur. 

Although I feel fairly confident that I would prefer the director’s cut over the first version we watched in class, I would be interested to see what my opinion would have been if we had watched the 1991 version before the 1982 one and before reading Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?. Despite the fact that the voice over created an artificial mood for the movie because of its blatant attempts to pander to the audience’s needs, I feel that without it or without having read the book, I would have felt hopelessly lost at certain points in the film. For instance, when Gaff first speaks to Rick at the outdoor restaurant, without the short explanation of what CitySpeak is, I would not have understood why another human was speaking a different language. Another example of this occurs when Bryant calls the Replicants “skinjobs.” With no explanation, it would have taken me until almost halfway through the film when Rick and Bryant are speaking with each other after Rick has retired Zhora to understand that he was referring to the androids in a derogatory manner. Ultimately though, I prefer the director’s cut to the theatrical version.