Blade Runner

Blade Runner is a 1982 American dark science fiction movie directed by Ridley Scott and written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples. It was based on the book Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick. Blade Runner's main actors are Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, Edward James Olmos and Daryl Hannah.

Plot

The movie takes place in Los Angeles in November 2019 when artificial human adults called "replicants" come to Earth. As replicants are not allowed on Earth anymore after some of them had attacked humans, police officers called "Blade Runners" hunt down and kill them on Earth. Rick Deckard is forced to hunt down some replicants in Los Angeles.

Response

Some movie critics did not like Blade Runner because they thought it was slow, but others liked its many ideas. The movie did not sell many tickets in North American movie theaters but was more popular in other countries. Even though it did not make much money, it was liked very much by teachers and science fiction fans. Blade Runner looked good and made the future look very dark and old. The movie showed important ideas of the 21st century such as globalization and genetic engineering. Blade Runner is an important example of cyberpunk and people believe it has changed the world and affected many cultures. Blade Runner made Hollywood interested in stories written by Philip K. Dick.

Versions

Seven versions of Blade Runner exist because of changes made by different people. The producers took Scott's cut and changed some things about it, which Scott did not like. In 1992, Scott released a Director's Cut version, which was made very fast. It cut the ending of the movie and removed the voice-over. Warner Bros. released the Final Cut, a new 25th anniversary version of the movie, in October 2007. It features some new scenes and removes some of the visible special effect.

Other websites

• BRMovie.com — alt.fan.blade-runner newsgroup site
  • Special Edition News Page
  • Encyclopedia Blade Runner
• BR-Insight — Thoughts of the movie