Harrison Ford is Retiring!!! "Blade Runner" Review.

Back in my review of “District 9” I made up the term “Social Fiction” a combination of social commentary and science fiction. “Blade Runner” is a perfect example of that genre; it questions the nature of humanity, it challenges what preconceptions about the future we may have, and it gives us something to think about when it comes to science fiction.

Sure this film has a fair amount of flying cars, robots, and futuristic looking skyscrapers, but they are all presented in a very pessimistic and dark way, making L.A. look very much like a noir film with Harrison Ford being the detective with the trench coat and the hat, except without the hat. It also reminds me a lot of the film “Taxi Driver” because of the showcasing of the city in such a grim way making it a character within its own right.

Harrison Ford plays Rick Deckard, and his job is to find replicants (robots) that humans have no more use for and retire (kill) them. The word retirement is cleverly chosen to avoid giving the replicants human traits since killing someone assumes that they were alive to begin with and that is a characteristic that should be reserved for humans and animals. Deckard is assigned to find and retire 4 replicants Roy, Leon, Zhora, and Pris. The job isn’t easy and certainly requires more than just shooting the replicants in the face.

I couldn't tell you that much more because I frankly didn't understand much of it. The script, although very intriguing and thought provoking, forgets to entertain on the most basic level. Ridley Scott is certainly the right director for this kind of subject and does a terrific job but it just isn't enough. Ford also does a great job as always somehow managing to balance 3 iconic characters without them blending into each other; Deckard doesn't have any Han Solo or Indiana Jones in him.

This film is a great example of an idea gone too far. The movie is too much subtext and not enough text, there are too many ideas and concepts of humanity and where we are headed, for us to handle, and we get lost in this amazingly designed, beautifully filmed, astonishingly imagined, but undeniably boring piece of cinema. I’m not going to say that this is a polished turd because I don’t believe that the film is actually bad while appearing good, no this film is actually magnificent, I just didn't enjoy watching it. I recommend watching this film at your own risk because some of the ideas in it are very hard to swallow but in the end you won’t regret watching it.

5/10

Tell me what you thought about the film in the comments below. I really really really want to hear your opinion.