Article-I.D.: ucbvax.7955
Posted: Thu Jul  8 11:22:29 1982
Received: Fri Jul  9 03:34:20 1982

>From JPM@Mit-Ai Thu Jul  8 11:20:09 1982

SF-LOVERS Digest         Thursday, 8 Jul 1982       Volume 6 : Issue 8

Today's Topics:
              SF Music - Star Trek: The Motion Picture,
                   SF Movies - TRON & Blade Runner
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Date: 4 Jul 1982 12:41:46-EDT
From: Lee.Schumacher at CMU-750X at CMU-10A
Subject: bladerunner, etc

First, A minor flame : Would people please stop posting canned movie
reviews!  I'm tired of having to sit through three reviews of a movie
that I'm not interested in. Besides, movie reviews usually reveal more
plot than I like to know going into a movie.

[ See volume 5, issue 66 for a general discussion of this point.
  We'll continue to distribute newswire stories as long as they (like
  anything else) are submitted.  Please also note that long messages
  are usually distributed over the weekends, and that many recent
  issues have been "one topic" digests (such as this one), enabling
  you to read or ignore material about a particular movie with
  relative ease.  -- Jim ]

Second, I saw a rerun of the pbs show 'Sneak Preview' and what they
said about BladeRunner seemed to jibe with everything I've heard. One
of the two hosts commented that it was visually a stunning movie, but
that he just couldn't get involved with the characters. This seems
like a good point, as I don't think that P. K. Dick is a very
interesting, or competent writer. I personally am tired of Showcase
films for the special effects wizards.

Third, Speaking of showcase films, has anyone heard anything about
'TRON' ??  The was an article about the computer animation in TRON in
the Smithsonian this month. It seemed quite interesting.

[ See volume 5, issues 45, 46, 48, and 55; volume 6, issue 5 -- Jim ]

                --Lee Schumacher.

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Date: 5 Jul 1982 1005-PDT
From: Robert Amsler 
Subject: Query about Blade Runner

What were the first (two?) origami figures which the other detective 
created. I didn't realize until the end of the movie that they were 
being offered almost as "tarot" interpretations of the events. The 
last one was a unicorn! A beautiful mythical (i.e. synthetic)
creature.

Caught the TV Sneak Previews reviews of "Blade Runner". As bad as any 
I've seen. As someone else mentioned to me, it would be as though
someone reviewed a Civil War drama about slavery and only noted the
special effects. None of the reviewers caught the plot apparently.

How is Blade Runner doing at the Box Office? I'd hate to see this one 
not make good money--they will be that much more shy of trying other 
quality science-fiction.

------------------------------

Date: 03 Jul 1982 1300-PDT
From: Richard Pattis 
Subject: Two Shorties


BladeRunner : The movie was interesting visually; the plot was boring
and shallow.  At first I was dismayed that Dick's name was not
presented during the opening credits -- as the movie progressed, I
felt relieved.  The plot of BladeRunner (below surface level) bears
little resemblance to "Do Androids Dread of Electic Sheep".  I suggest
that all interested parties read the book.

On TV yesterday I caught a promo for ABC's wide world of sports.  The 
music they were playing was the theme song from ST-TMP.  Has this been
going on for a long time, or has it just started?

rich

------------------------------

Date: 5 Jul 1982 0129-EDT
From: Steven J. Zeve 
Subject: Those outside reviews, and my feelings about Blade Runner

Hmm, just read all those reviews.  For the record, I think Freedman 
slept through 30 seconds out of every minute; at least Maslin seems to
have actually seen the film.  I would say that Maslin's review is 
reasonably accurate in terms of details of the movie (although her 
review does read like she may have read the book before writing the 
review).  I recommend that everyone read Dick's book even if you don't
go to see the movie.

Although major portions of the book have been discarded or rewritten, 
I believe that the movie does manage to raise the same questions as 
the book.  Most of the changes seem to have been made because a two 
hour movie simply cannot do justice to a whole novel; this has 
resulted in some portions of the book being discarded and others being
rewritten to eliminate references to the discarded sections.  Although
the film has some problems (it a tends to be somewhat confusing, I 
still wonder what happened to the fifth replicant that made it to 
Earth - Rachael doesn't count, she was already on Earth), I believe 
these problems are no worse than those of Dick's book (it is just as 
confusing, I still can't figure out which replicants came to Earth in 
which groups).

        Steve Z.

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Date: 4 Jul 1982 14:05:50 EDT (Sunday)
From: David Mankins 
Subject: Blade Runner

I saw ``Blade Runner'' at the earliest opportunity, having been a Dick
fan for some time, and having looked forward to what might have been a
real science fiction film (the first one of recent times) in which
people were faced with hard problems brought on by the advance of
science--the first one since ``Dark Star''.

``Blade Runner'' sucks raw eggs through a straw.  GREAT production
designs, though.  If you ignore the voice-overs, and the story, and
just watch the scenery roll by, it's a damn fine movie (I might add
that this same statement is true of ``Escape from New York'', which
was a totally BEAUTIFUL film (who'd think that grungy, litter-strewn
streets filmed under the glare of mercury-vapor lights could be
beautiful? )).

What you get are unmotivated characters doing totally objectionable
things for 90 minutes in ``living'' color.  Rick Deckard is an
ex-blade runner--he has left it, having grown sick of the killing and
violence.  How do we know he's sick of the violence?  He tells us at
the beginning of the film.  That's the last we hear of it, as he goes
on a killing spree that makes the last ten minutes of ``Taxi Driver''
look tame by comparison.  Why DOES Deckard go back to work?  The lame
excuse ``I'd rather be a killer than a victim'' seems pretty lame by
the time he's finished.

We're told that androids are bad because they lack emotions.  Then we
watch one go insane at viewing the mangled corpse of his mate, and
evince very real emotions.  Ridley Scott COULD have posed the
interesting question "Who's human in this picture--the ruthless
killers in the police force, or these androids confronted with their
own mortality, with persecution and intolerance?" But he doesn't.  He
ducks the interesting questions to give us a lovingly-filmed splatter
movie.

I also found the romance between Deckard and Rachel Tyrrel to be 
totally objectionable.  We're told Deckard loves her, but we're given
no reason to believe it.  In one scene Deckard practically rapes
Rachel, telling her to "say you want more", "say you love me", with
the sort of insensitivity that sends Andrea Dworkin reaching for her
censorship scissors.  I found myself wondering if Rachel really did
love Deckard, or if she was just playing along because she was afraid
that any minute now he would blow her head off (which is his job,
after all).  But its okay, the movie seems to say, 'cause deep down
inside every woman wants to be raped.

When is Hollywood going to give us a Science-Fiction movie that is
more than just snazzy wrapping around an empty package?

------------------------------

Date: 3 Jul 1982 1749-PDT
From: Robert Amsler 
Subject: Blade Runner Reviews

As I am in artificial intelligence, I probably do see more merit in
Blade Runner than say, a Shakespearian Literary Reviewer---but the
published reviews I have seen so far have been so utterly oblivious to
the issues which Blade Runner raised that I find it hard to believe
these "movie critics" are qualified for their jobs.

Above all, Blade Runner is a movie about the consequences to society
of creating artificially intelligent machines which in virtually every
regard are our equals and then using them as slaves. It is a profound
statement about the morality of certain aspects of artificial
intelligence and about the potential consequences of synthesizing a
human mind complete with emotions and memories. I have seen reviewers
comment about the fine special effects, about the violence, about the
vision of L.A. in ruins (recall that Dick's original book was a bit of
an eco-catastrophe satire)--- BUT they ignore what to me is the major
moral dilemma which the movie tried to raise. Do we have the right to
recreate slavery by manufacturing human machines.

Some reviews have noted the excessive violence shown when replicants
are "retired" by Harrison Ford. The point of that was to emphasize the
similarity between killing human beings and what was in that society
dealt with as simply stopping a machine that had gone wrong.  Some
reviews have noted that the "replicants" ran away--and stopped there!
WHY did they run away? They ran away from slavery! They ran away from
being used as machines although they had been built to understand and
react, externally and internally, as human beings. They simply wanted
freedom.

Blade Runner is among the finest science fiction to ever make it to
the screen.  It deals with contemporary issues such as genetic
engineering and artificial intelligence. It contains a good detective
story.  It raises issues of the morality of science. It is superbly
executed.  The plot is intricate but eminently well connected
(provided you don't ignore the basic point that "replicants" are not
humans--but manufactured entities).  It contains statements about 
ecological ruin, about a future in which virtually all animals are
gone, apart from zoos. It may be a landmark. It is certain to become a
classic that will be intelligently discussed in both cinema and
science-fiction circles for decades to come--perhaps as classic to
science-fiction as the Maltise Falcon has become to mystery films.
More significantly, it probably augurs the beginning of an era in 
which science-fiction movies will be made from hit science-fiction
books. And the prospects of finally getting beyond the TV-show plot is
an event which will be historically significant.

------------------------------

Date: 4 Jul 1982 1913-PDT
From: Craig W. Reynolds 
Reply-to: REYNOLDS at RAND-AI
Subject: Blade Runner - Explosions

SHG@MIT-OZ asked what the "explosions" at the start of Blade Runner 
where. They were just supposed to be flame-offs of the flameble 
chemicals coming out of those industrial plants. Each of the flames 
comes from the top of one of the stacks of the plants, along with a
light effect to make the model look like it is being illuminated by 
the flames, which were matted in later. In fact, if you watch closely 
you will see that these flame elements were not really matted (which 
involves holding out the background image) but simply "added" in (by 
DX - double exposure). At one point there is a very large flame that 
covers most of the screen, as the bottom of the flame lifts away there
is no smoke or soot holding out the background.

In general I liked Blade Runner, there was a real story which was
merely supported by the special effects. The effects, while good, were
not the stars of the film. I did find it hard to believe that some of
these interiors were THAT smokey, the air on the street level was
better than inside some of the buildings.

-c

------------------------------

Date: 6-Jul-82 16:31:21 PDT (Tuesday)
From: Newman.es at PARC-MAXC
Subject: That rain in "Blade Runner"

According to a recent news article in LA, the constant rain in "Blade
Runner" was put in so that the audience couldn't tell that the movie
was shot entirely on a studio backlot.  Without the rain, the edges of
the set would have been visible.

/Ron

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End of SF-LOVERS Digest
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