The Theatrical Cut of Blade Runner Is My Blade Runner

Against Director’s Cuts

I wanted to see “Blade Runner” when it came out in 1982, but I wasn’t allowed to because I was ten and it was a double AA certificate which in England meant that no one under 15 was allowed admittance. So I got around this in two ways. First of all, I listened to Moggy, who was two years older and looked five years older, mainly due to a bad case of acne that dissuaded overlong inspection, and who had a preternatural talent for telling you a film he had seen from start to finish in photographic detail. He would give us entire descriptions of “The Fly” and “Aliens” during the bus rides to and from school long before we saw either film.

The second way was I read the book. The film tie-in edition of Philip K. Dick’s novel didn’t come with the usual 8 pages of color illustrations that novelizations usually promised, nor did it come with a warning that the film bore little resemblance to the “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” We weren’t going to se Harrison Ford in a leather codpiece or climbing an endless hill to empathize with a mystical figure; no mood organs, no Buster Friendly - who resembles the “I’d buy that for a dollar” guy in Paul Verhoeven’s “Robocop.”

When I did get to see the film in 1983, it was via a Warner Brothers rental DVD which had to be taken back to the garage later that afternoon so I watched it in the morning and had to stop for lunch. I watched it at a friend’s house because we didn’t have a video recorder yet. I found it violent, dark and strange. Han Solo had another demeanor, rarely wisecracking. There’s a moment when Deckard is being beaten up by Leon, where Leon tells him: “Hard to live in pain, isn’t it?” And his come back is a sarcastic (?): “Oh I agree!” He also is incredibly lame when he tries to persuade a heartbroken Rachel that the whole thing about her not being a human being and all her memories are false were just a prank by him and Tyrell: “Bad joke, I made a bad joke. No, really. I mean it. I’m sorry.” Does he really expect her to be convinced by that? Does he just want her to leave?

Rutger Hauer was terrifying; Vangelis’ music was gorgeous. I listened to him forever after that. He became one of my first musicians along with Ennio Morricone, Jeff Wayne and Geoff Love. It first showed on ITV in the UK in June of 1986. I had to persuade my brother to let me have the black and white portable so I could watch it in my room. It looked brilliant in black and white.

I had read in magazines that there was a longer cut. As with many films, there was a legendary 5, 6 or 8 hour cut - the numbers varied but the marathon epic “Blade Runner” meant that out there, somewhere, was this whole universe of “Blade Runner.” We had a cupful but actually there were buckets of the stuff. In reality, this is nonsense. Assembly cuts are put together by editors and contain multiple takes of the same scene and the same shot so that the director can watch them and choose the best. Assembly cuts are never intended for theatrical release. Some directors - Hitchcock and Ford and Friedkin spring immediately to mind - intentionally shot the minimum refusing to shoot what they didn’t intend to be in the finished picture. This way they could pre-edit their films as they were shooting them and prevent the studio monkeying around. Other directors, Terrence Malick is certainly one, shoot enormous amounts of footage and find the film in the edit. Hence very long postproduction periods. Most directors will exist somewhere towards the middle of this spectrum.

The Director’s Cut of “Blade Runner” came out in 1993, with a Final Cut coming some years later. There is also a difference between the International Theatrical Cut and the US Theatrical Cut. I’ve rewatched the film as much as any film with the possible exception of “Life of Brian” and “Casablanca.” But at least half of those rewatches were of the original theatrical cut on pan and scan VHS. Sometimes I’d adjust the color on the TV to reproduce the black and white I’d enjoyed for its TV premiere.

But it’s been at least two decades maybe three since I saw the theatrical version so last night I decided to watch it once more. This was via a DVD that came with a box set of different versions (there’s even a work print of the film in here). First thing to note is that I loved watching the film in a way that hadn’t been cleaned up and remastered. The effects looked like effects. You’ll often hear praise for a blu-ray saying the old film “holds up” and “looks like it was filmed yesterday”. This is meant as high praise but it also shows an unthinking set of values which I we’re applying. I don’t want “Blade Runner” to look like it was filmed yesterday. It was filmed in 1982 and the effects don’t need to hold up to… what standards exactly? The stunt double doesn’t look much like Joanna Cassidy as she flies through the glass, but honestly that scene is so emotionally powerful, it really isn’t something I’m looking for or notice. Some wires might be visible here and there; the models look more like models, but who cares? It gives the film a more Gilliam-esque feel.

What about the voiceover? Okay, it sounds a bit like Steve Martin in “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid” and rumor has it -one Ford vehemently denies - that he gave lifeless line readings hoping they wouldn’t use them. But something I’ve never got with any of the subsequent version is why the introduction of Deckard lingers so long and uninterestingly on him. I miss that opening: “They don’t advertise for killers in a newspaper.” It is uneven, especially disappearing in the latter half of the film only to come back like gangbusters to wrap things up all too neatly. But the idea hangs with the genre of this being a neo-noir and Deckard a Marlowe-like figure. It also is consistent with his character. That exchange with Leon makes more sense tonally with the voiceover than without it.

Sure, not all of the voiceover works any more - “he’s the kinda cop that in history books used to call black men…” - being an outrageous example, but there’s some fairly crude generic dialogue in the film as well: “Talk about beauty and the beast. She’s both!” And as for the film being of its time, the “love”/rape scene with Rachel does not play.

I also liked Deckard’s explanation of Roy Batty’s final actions. Watching it as a kid, I often struggled to work out what Roy Batty was up to, which made him all the more fascinating. Why did he push a nail through his hand for instance? I mean, that looked like it fucking hurt. So to get some insight from Deckard helped. I can live with that. I also like the dove flying up into a sky that is for the first time blue. It makes more sense to me. Light is finally breaking into the film. Dawn is dawning. We might get a happy ending.

The “happy ending” with the off cuts from “The Shining” never made much sense. It was so tonally different and existed in such a different place, that it almost felt like a dream sequence. Why was anyone living in Los Angeles in 2019 when apparently they could go and live in Colorado which had escaped environmental and nuclear devastation? The later versions weren’t new versions but reversions to older cuts. Scott has assured us that the unicorn sequence was filmed purposely for “Blade Runner” and was not a bit of “Legend” tacked on. Personally, I find this the worst part of the Final Version. It makes shit all sense and is just as tonally jarring as the 1982 “happy ending”. It’s not even clear that it’s in Deckard’s dream. He says to Rachel “I dreamt music.” He decidedly does not say: “I dreamt music and a big unicorn.” I know that it sets up the reveal for Deckard being a Replicant, but I don’t think so. First of all, Deckard as Replicant is served in the original film already with specific shots where his eyes gleam with the cat-like opaqueness of Rachel. Secondly, the viewer has to do a lot of lifting to go from “oh, Gaff has left some origami” to “which proves he has access to Deckard’s dreams and knows he’s a Replicant but - despite being himself a Blade Runner - he has just let him walk away for no particular reason, and if they are making Replicant Blade Runners to hunt Replicants, does that mean Gaff is a Replicant as well?”

I can fully understand a director wanting to improve on a film which he feels was spoiled by creative decision that were taken out of his hands. I also understand the hunger in the audience and fans of the film to get the true, authentic version. It’s a hunger I’ve felt myself, hence the 5 disc box set. But now we have to deal with a new reality. “Blade Runner” no longer exists in one version. The 1982 and the 1993 versions have radical differences narratively and thematically. The differences might be truer to Ridley Scott’s vision, but which Ridley Scott: the Scott who had just made “Alien” or the one who had just made “GI Jane”? We’re in a gallery of mirrors looking for truth among the distortions. 2024 me will probably watch his Blu-Ray the next time the yearning to watch “Blade Runner” is upon me, but revisiting the theatrical version made me realize it has been unfairly maligned and ultimately is the version of Blade Runner that I fell in love with and still love the most.