When this film came out on June 25,1982 in North American theatres "Blade Runner" initially underperformed which left critics polarized. Some praised it's thematic complexity and visuals while others critiqued (in my words "buried") the movie due to it's slow pacing and lack of action.
"Blade Runner" is a 1982 sci-fi film directed by the legendary Ridley Scott (Director of Alien) the screenplay was written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples and it's an adaptation of Philip K.Dick's novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" The movie stars Harrison Ford,Rutger Hauer,Sean Young and Edward James Olmos The film is set in a dystopian future (2019 in Los Angeles) in which synthetic humans known as replicants are bio-engineered by the powerful Tyrell Corporation to work on space colonies. When a fugitive gang of advanced replicants lead by Roy Batty escape back to Earth it's up to a cop named Rick Deckard to hunt down Batty and his gang.
Many years after it's release "Blade Runner" became a cult classic. Mainly due to the fact it was starting to be regarded as one of the greatest science fiction films ever made. Hailed for it's production design by depicting a high tech but decaying future,the film is often regarded as both a leading example of neo-noir cinema as well as a foundational work of the cyberpunk genre. It has influenced so many sci-fi movies,video games,anime and TV series. It also brought Philip K.Dick's work to Hollywood's attention and lead to several film adaptations of his works. In 1993 it was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry by The Library of Congress.
The Film's Budget cost was $30 million and why was it so expensive? Mainly because there were seven different versions of "Blade Runner" that existed as a result of controversial changes requested by the studio executives. A Director's cut was released in 1992 after a strong response to test screenings of a workprint. This in conjunction with the film's popularity as a video rental made it one of the earliest movies to be put out on DVD. There was a 25th anniversary Director's Cut of the film that Warner Bros. put out in 2007 which was digitally remastered it's the only version of which Ridley Scott himself retained artistic control.
In 2017 a sequel called "Blade Runner 2049" was released along side a trilogy of short films covering in the 30 year span between the two movie settings. The movie did $41.6 million at the box office in it's initial run.
My overall rating of "Blade Runner" is a 75/100 for all it's hype the movie did lack alot of fast paced action and dragged on repetitively. However it's credited for creating the Cyberpunk genre. So I'll give the movie credit for that.
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