Blade Runner 2049 [SPOILERS]

[Ryujin]

Saw it at the weekend and thought it was a grand spectacle that was very in keeping with the earlier film. Denis Villeneuve deserves a lot of praise

That said, I always felt that the first film tread a very fine line between replicants being humans (manufactured slaves) and "not quite" humans (i.e. in the book they are missing empathy). In the new film replicants are clearly a slave underclass that will rise up to defeat their oppressors (presumably in the next film if one happens).

Mind you I've always been firmly in the camp that Deckard is human and not a replicant - if he is a replicant his personal growth in the original film is undercut - and so I'm perhaps not Ridley's target audience given his feelings on the subject!

In the new film, Deckard is a little ineffectual but it is a continuation of his story rather than K's. Although K does have his own arc in the film.

I liked the ending but it could easily be "the end" or "the beginning" of a third film.

As an aside, I was very worried at one point that Deckard had been brought back just to die a la Han Solo . . .

Apparently in some cuts of the original pretty much all question that Deckard is a Replicant is removed; ie. he is one. I would tend to agree that this movie is largely about Deckard's story, from K's point of view. There's also a lot of resonance between the stories of the two characters.

I had to digest my impressions of this movie for 24 hours. At first I thought that I hated the soundtrack. I later realized that it was just that booming, distorted stuff whenever a car flew out of the city limits that I actually hated. The rest was fine. It's just that stood out so much it was the nail that gets hammered down. Leto's performance was his usual bizarre crap. In this case it just served to highlight how stellar was the performance by everyone else. Even Dave Bautista managed what I would call a deeply emotional performance.

The effects, with the exception of the previously stated car leaving the city limits, were insanely good. Those car scenes looked, to me, like a cardboard cutout on green screen by comparison to the other effects. When Rachael came on screen I was wondering how they found an actress who looked so much like a young Sean Young. At least until I saw the credits. Seems it was a computer generated character mapped onto a flesh and blood actress, without the usual "uncanny valley" elements. Just beautifully done.

The movie isn't perfect, but it's damned good.

 

[cmad1977]

It was awesome.
Not sure it was good.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Istbor]

Well, I liked it. Fit well in the with the older one. Worth seeing it at least once on the big screen. Will probably buy it once it is out. I am trying to cut down on my piracy.

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

Loved the film. The music was intense but appropriate.

A friend asked this question and I wasn't sure how to respond : How did K know where to look for Deckard?

AR

 

[MarkB]

A friend asked this question and I wasn't sure how to respond : How did K know where to look for Deckard?

As I recall, the specific radioactivity of the particulates analysed from the wooden toy horse matched that of Las Vegas. From there, it was just a matter of using the drone equivalent of "zoom and enhance" to identify signs of habitation in town, since people kept away out of fear of contamination even though the radiation had died down.

Which, now that I think about it, is weird given that this is the same movie in which people live, squabble and battle within a literal scrapheap that's almost certainly a lot more toxic.

 

[tomBitonti]

As I recall, the specific radioactivity of the particulates analysed from the wooden toy horse matched that of Las Vegas. From there, it was just a matter of using the drone equivalent of "zoom and enhance" to identify signs of habitation in town, since people kept away out of fear of contamination even though the radiation had died down.

Which, now that I think about it, is weird given that this is the same movie in which people live, squabble and battle within a literal scrapheap that's almost certainly a lot more toxic.

There is the scene where the toy horse is analyzed. The horse had a particular pattern of radiation which led to Las Vegas.

That scene was a nice homage to the original book, which had quite a lot about artificial animals which didn't make it into the original movie.

What I (think I) got from the dialog was that Las Vegas used to be a lot more radioactive. But yeah, there seemed to be a lot of useful stuff lying around. Perhaps there were barriers preventing access to the site.

Thx!
TomB

 

[Erekose]

I was chatting with friends about the film last night and it occurred to me that, in the first film, wasn’t the Earth already heavily polluted and virtually everyone healthy enough had already shipped out to the off world colonies? The replicants were an incentive to go off world and were illegal on Earth. Which is why a special police unit had been setup to retire those replicants that escaped and illegally came back to Earth (which was considered unusual, at least by Deckard).

Just seems to jar with the heavily populated world we see in the film ...

Although it’s always possible I’m overthinking what should be considered a few hours of ephemeral entertainment

 

[MarkB]

I was chatting with friends about the film last night and it occurred to me that, in the first film, wasn’t the Earth already heavily polluted and virtually everyone healthy enough had already shipped out to the off world colonies? The replicants were an incentive to go off world and were illegal on Earth. Which is why a special police unit had been setup to retire those replicants that escaped and illegally came back to Earth (which was considered unusual, at least by Deckard).

Just seems to jar with the heavily populated world we see in the film ...

Although it’s always possible I’m overthinking what should be considered a few hours of ephemeral entertainment

We don't actually see a heavily populated world in the film. We see a heavily populated city.

The string impression I got was of a world in which most of the population had been crammed into cities somewhat protected from the pollutants, along with surrounding ghettos, and that much of the world outside those places was heavily depopulated and mostly unuseable.

 

[Erekose]

We don't actually see a heavily populated world in the film. We see a heavily populated city.

The strong impression I got was of a world in which most of the population had been crammed into cities somewhat protected from the pollutants, along with surrounding ghettos, and that much of the world outside those places was heavily depopulated and mostly unuseable.

Fair point, but in the first film I'm sure JF Sebastian says something like, "Room enough for everyone" . . . presumably now that virtually everyone has gone off world. Given the ecosystem disaster (and recovery via protein farms), why would Earth suddenly be more populated??? I suppose given the EMP detonation, the ability to ship people off world might have been limited for some time . . .

 

[MarkB]

Fair point, but in the first film I'm sure JF Sebastian says something like, "Room enough for everyone" . . . presumably now that virtually everyone has gone off world. Given the ecosystem disaster (and recovery via protein farms), why would Earth suddenly be more populated??? I suppose given the EMP detonation, the ability to ship people off world might have been limited for some time . . .

I honestly can't remember how it was treated in the first movie, but really, the mass exporting of humanity from Earth would be such a massive undertaking as to beggar belief, robotic workforce or not. Sending off millions, enough to establish viable colonies elsewhere, is one thing. Sending billions is quite another.