Man Has Made His Match... Now It's His Problem

A chilling, bold, mesmerizing, futuristic detective thriller.


A blend of science fiction and noir detective fiction, Blade Runner (1982) was a box office and critical bust upon its initial exhibition, but its unique postmodern production design became hugely influential within the sci-fi genre, and the film gained a significant cult following that increased its stature. Harrison Ford stars as Rick Deckard, a retired cop in Los Angeles circa 2019. L.A. has become a pan-cultural dystopia of corporate advertising, pollution and flying automobiles, as well as replicants, human-like androids with short life spans built by the Tyrell Corporation for use in dangerous off-world colonization. Deckard's former job in the police department was as a talented blade runner, a euphemism for detectives that hunt down and assassinate rogue replicants. Called before his one-time superior (M. Emmett Walsh), Deckard is forced back into active duty. A quartet of replicants led by Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer) has escaped and headed to Earth, killing several humans in the process. After meeting with the eccentric Eldon Tyrell (Joe Turkel), creator of the replicants, Deckard finds and eliminates Zhora (Joanna Cassidy), one of his targets. Attacked by another replicant, Leon (Brion James), Deckard is about to be killed when he's saved by Rachael (Sean Young), Tyrell's assistant and a replicant who's unaware of her true nature. In the meantime, Batty and his replicant pleasure model lover, Pris (Darryl Hannah) use a dying inventor, J.F. Sebastian (William Sanderson) to get close to Tyrell and murder him. Deckard tracks the pair to Sebastian's, where a bloody and violent final confrontation between Deckard and Batty takes place on a skyscraper rooftop high above the city. In 1992, Ridley Scott released a popular director's cut that removed Deckard's narration, added a dream sequence, and excised a happy ending imposed by the results of test screenings; these legendary behind-the-scenes battles were chronicled in a 1996 tome, Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner by Paul M. Sammon


Blade Runner is a 1982 British-American dystopian science fiction action film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, and Sean Young. The screenplay, written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples, is loosely based on the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick.
The film depicts a dystopian Los Angeles in November 2019 in which genetically engineered organic robots called replicants—visually indistinguishable from adult humans—are manufactured by the powerful Tyrell Corporation as well as by other "mega–manufacturers" around the world. Their use on Earth is banned and replicants are exclusively used for dangerous, menial or leisure work on off-world colonies. Replicants who defy the ban and return to Earth are hunted down and "retired" by police special operatives known as "Blade Runners". The plot focuses on a brutal and cunning group of recently escaped replicants hiding in Los Angeles and the burnt-out expert Blade Runner, Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), who reluctantly agrees to take on one more assignment to hunt them down.
Blade Runner initially polarized critics: some were displeased with the pacing, while others enjoyed its thematic complexity. The film performed poorly in North American theaters but has since become a cult film.[2] It has been hailed for its production design, depicting a "retrofitted" future,[3] and remains a leading example of the neo-noir genre.[4] It brought the work of Philip K. Dick to the attention of Hollywood and several later films were based on his work.[5] Ridley Scott regards Blade Runner as "probably" his most complete and personal film.[6][7] In 1993, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Seven versions of the film have been shown for various markets as a result of controversial changes made by film executives. A rushed Director's Cut was released in 1992 after a strong response to workprint screenings. This, in conjunction with its popularity as a video rental, made it one of the first films released on DVD, resulting in a basic disc with mediocre video and audio quality.[8] In 2007, Warner Bros. released The Final Cut, a 25th anniversary digitally remastered version by Scott in select theaters, and subsequently on DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-ray Disc.


Although Blade Runner is ostensibly an action film, it operates on multiple dramatic and narrative levels. It is indebted to film noir conventions: the femme fatale; protagonist-narration (removed in later versions); dark and shadowy cinematography; and the questionable moral outlook of the hero – in this case, extended to include reflections upon the nature of his own humanity.[50][51] It is a literate science fiction film, thematically enfolding the philosophy of religion and moral implications of human mastery of genetic engineering in the context of classical Greek drama and hubris.[52] It also draws on Biblical images, such as Noah's flood,[53] and literary sources, such as Frankenstein.[54] Linguistically, the theme of mortality is subtly reiterated in the chess game between Roy and Tyrell, based on the famous Immortal Game of 1851,[55] though Scott has said that was coincidental.[56]
Blade Runner delves into the implications of technology on the environment and on society by reaching to the past, using literature, religious symbolism, classical dramatic themes, and film noir. This tension between past, present, and future is mirrored in the retrofitted future of Blade Runner, which is high-tech and gleaming in places but decayed and old elsewhere. Ridley Scott described the film as: "extremely dark, both literally and metaphorically, with an oddly masochistic feel", in an interview by Lynn Barber for The Observer (London) in 2002. Scott "liked the idea of exploring pain" in the wake of his brother's skin cancer death: "When he was ill, I used to go and visit him in London, and that was really traumatic for me."[7]
An aura of paranoia suffuses the film: corporate power looms large; the police seem omnipresent; vehicle and warning lights probe into buildings; and the consequences of huge biomedical power over the individual are explored – especially the consequences for replicants of their implanted memories. Control over the environment is depicted as taking place on a vast scale, hand in hand with the absence of any natural life, with artificial animals substituting for their extinct predecessors. This oppressive backdrop explains the frequently referenced migration of humans to extra-terrestrial ("off-world") colonies.[57] The dystopian themes explored in Blade Runner are an early example of cyberpunk concepts expanding into film. Eyes are a recurring motif, as are manipulated images, calling into question reality and our ability to accurately perceive and remember it.[58][59][60]
These thematic elements provide an atmosphere of uncertainty for Blade Runner's central theme of examining humanity. In order to discover replicants, an empathy test is used, with a number of its questions focused on the treatment of animals – seemingly an essential indicator of someone's "humanity". The replicants appear to show compassion and concern for one another and are juxtaposed against human characters who lack empathy while the mass of humanity on the streets is cold and impersonal. The film goes so far as to put in doubt whether Deckard is human, and forces the audience to re-evaluate what it means to be human.[61]
The question of whether Deckard is intended to be a human or a replicant has been an ongoing controversy since the film's release.[62] Both Michael Deeley and Harrison Ford wanted Deckard to be human while Hampton Fancher preferred ambiguity.[63] Ridley Scott has confirmed that in his vision Deckard is a replicant.[64][65] Deckard's unicorn dream sequence, inserted into the Director's Cut, coinciding with Gaff's parting gift of an origami unicorn is seen by many as showing that Deckard is a replicant – as Gaff could have accessed Deckard's implanted memories.[54][66] The interpretation that Deckard is a replicant is challenged by others who believe the unicorn imagery shows that the characters, whether human or replicant, share the same dreams and recognize their affinity,[67] or that the absence of a decisive answer is crucial to the film's main theme.[68] The inherent ambiguity and uncertainty of the film, as well as its textual richness, have permitted viewers to see it from their own perspectives.[69]


Blade Runner was released in 1,290 theaters on June 25, 1982. That date was chosen by producer Alan Ladd, Jr. because his previous highest-grossing films (Star Wars and Alien) had a similar opening date (May 25) in 1977 and 1979, making the date his "lucky day".[70] The gross for the opening weekend was a disappointing $6.15 million.[71] A significant factor in the film's rather poor box office performance was that it was released around the same time as other science fiction films, including The Thing, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, and, most significantly, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, which dominated box office revenues that summer.[72]
Film critics were polarized as some felt the story had taken a back seat to special effects and that it was not the action/adventure the studio had advertised. Others acclaimed its complexity and predicted it would stand the test of time.[73]
In the United States, a general criticism was its slow pacing that detracts from other strengths;[74] Sheila Benson from the Los Angeles Times called it "Blade Crawler", while Pat Berman in The State and Columbia Record described it as "science fiction pornography".[75] Pauline Kael noted that with its "extraordinary" congested-megalopolis sets, Blade Runner "has its own look, and a visionary sci-fi movie that has its own look can't be ignored – it has its place in film history" but "hasn't been thought out in human terms".[76] Roger Ebert praised the visuals of both the original Blade Runner and the Director's Cut versions and recommended it for that reason; however, he found the human story clichéd and a little thin.[24] In 2007, upon release of The Final Cut, Ebert somewhat revised his original opinion of the film and added it to his list of Great Movies, while noting, "I have been assured that my problems in the past with Blade Runner represent a failure of my own taste and imagination, but if the film was perfect, why has Sir Ridley continued to tinker with it?"[77] Blade Runner holds a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes with an average score of 8.5 out of 10 from 104 reviews.[78] The site's main consensus reads "Misunderstood when it first hit theaters, the influence of Ridley Scott's mysterious, neo-noir Blade Runner has deepened with time. A visually remarkable, achingly human sci-fi masterpiece."

Release Date: June 25, 1982

Distrib: Warner Brothers


Boxoffice: : $27,580,111 2013: $74,485,100