Blade Runner - The Director's Cut

Blade Runner (1982)

Directed by Ridley Scott

Screenplay by Hampton Fancher and David Webb Peoples

Based on the novel, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" by Phillip K. Dick

Currently #125 of the Top 250 Films of All Time on IMDb (as of this posting)

Stars: Harrison Ford, Sean Young, Rutger Howard, Daryl Hannah, Brion James, Joe Turkel, William Sanderson, M. Emmet Walsh, Edward James Olmos and Joanna Cassidy

For the longest time, people were talking, comparing, remembering or call back to Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. People was saying that it was awesome. I kinda felt out of the loop that I didn't know what people were talking about with this movie. The film was nominated for two Oscars for Best Art Direction and Best Visual Effects. This is like the thinking man's action movie and I enjoyed it.

In the not too distant future -- roughly seven years from now -- Dr. Eldon Tyrell (Turkel) created robots known as "replicants" that were like humans with superior strength and agility that were used as slave labor for the colonization of other inhabitable planets. A revolt by the replicants has made them illegal aliens essentially to the planet Earth. Any replicants that were found on Earth would be killed on sight by blade runners. A police chief, Bryant (Walsh) is informed that four replicants have broken away from exile and come to Earth. He needs to find the best blade runner to "retire" them who is retired, Rick Deckard (Ford).

I will just get this out of the way. I felt that same way like I did with Total Recall. The original, not the remake. I felt that "future" the filmmakers portrayed looked very dated. I can understand that it was eighties and everything has to being dark and dirty with car that look like flying tin cans.

Now, that is out of the way. I can focus on the good things with this film. The replicants of the films are not the bad guys, per se. They are beings that are existing that want to have more life that limited four years lifespan that they have. The movie makes you question you own mortality. Robots should not be able to have emotions, but the replicants of the movie do. Harrison Ford has made a different kind of hero like he did with Hans Solo and Indiana Jones. Deckard felt like unlikely hero that wants to do his job and go home. There was a romance between Ford and Sean Young's character, Rachael that I thought was handled beautifully. It wasn't forced or tacked on. I like that.

My Rating

The Shining

The Shining (1980)

Directed by Stanley Kubrick

Screenplay by Stanley Kubrick & Diane Johnson

Based on the novel by Stephen King

Currently #45 of the Top 250 Films of All Time on IMDb (as of this posting)

Stars: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers, Barry Nelson, Philip Stone and Joe Turkel

Started off my Birthday Moive Blog-a-thon, I wanted to see a movie that is very iconic that I have never seen. The first thing that came to my mind was The Shining. I have seen clips of the movie, but I have never seen the actual movie until now. I don't know if it's just me, but I don't get was the fuss is all about.

A former schoolteacher turned struggling writer, Jack Torrance (Nicholson) moves his family into the Overlook Hotel in Denver as the hotel is closing for the winter. Jack, his wife Wendy (Duvall) and his son, Danny (Lloyd) have the whole hotel is themselves for the next five months. Prior to their arrival, Jack was told by the keeper of the property Stuart Ullman (Nelson) that the previous caretaker killed his wife and children years prior. Keeping that from the family, they discovered that the spirits of  the hotel are out to get them one way or another.

The hype surrounding the movie was palpable. I was fully expecting to have a great time with the movie, but I found the movie was very boring. I know that Kubrick wanted to created a mood of cabin fever, paranoia and the slow decent to madness, but I was wishing for it to hurry the fuck up. I thought that Jack Nicholson was in a completely different movie than the rest of the cast. I thought he was the best part of the film and the others were in some low rent B movie. I couldn't stand Shelley Duvall's characters with her googly eyes and her pretending to be scared of Jack. She was awful. The thing that really distracted me was the horrible clothes that she had on. The little boy, Danny was fine, but he got annoying towards the end of the movie.

I felt that the movie was all built up and no pay off. I enjoyed the sequence in the maze, but I felt that those moments were too far between. The choice of music for the film was jarring, because it was trying to build the suspense that leads to nowhere. The ending of the movie, I saw coming from a mile away. I felt disappointed with the movie, because I felt I would be creeped out and scared, but I didn't. It's a shame. I wanted to like this movie, but I didn't.

My Rating