Blade Runner: The Final Cut
I don't care about the proliferation of different versions of Blade Runner - it's a
good film, obviously, but it's not Ulysses. The changes are pretty minimal in any case - the only one I noticed was that Rutger Hauer says "I want more life, father" when he kills Tyrell, as opposed to the more Withnialian original. Which is a shame, because I used to enjoy imagining him shambling around drinking bottles of Haut Brion from the 50s while complaining that the Tannhauser Belt wasn't what it used to be.
Anyway, I didn't think it was that great a film. I don't know if it's because I've seen it, like, infinity times, but I'm not particularly interested if Deckard is a replicant any more. Although when I was a kid that seemed like one of the most amazing conspiracies which turned out to be true - a bit like
Skull and Bones, for instance. And I don't rate his pulling technique either.
What I
would like to know is why none of the action happens in the horizontal plane. It's almost like a visual tic that they are always getting in flying cars, or running up stairs, and you could make quite a big list of all the times that there are lifts in the movie. I wrote quite a pretentious essay about that in one of my finals papers, and while it's something that's certainly observable in the film, I couldn't come up with a good reason why. So if you have any good ideas that don't involve the word "stratification" I would like to hear them.
Silent Light
Although this film is about 2 and a quarter hours long, it's so minimalist that there's only about 150 cuts in it, and I reckon all the dialogue would fit onto a couple of sides of A4. Even in Big Font. It's about a man in a Mennonite community in Mexico who's bowling in the next lane over, if you know what I mean and I think you do. I'd just done the last of my Christmas shopping and was feeling pretty tired, so I had a bit of a sleep - and when I woke up it was still the same shot.
I was thinking of getting up and leaving because it was quite boring but what kept me in the cinema was the old couple directly behind me. Her mouth was wired directly to her brain, while he grunted like a caveman in a Raquel Welsh movie. They'd started during the adverts.
"That's a clever ad" she said after the grim one where Ken promises to break your legs if you go to work on your motorbike.
"MMmm yes"
Then the trailer for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly came on.
"I'd like to see
that film"
"Mmm yes"
The trailer for 4 weeks, 3 hours & 2 hours came on:
"Is that film in French?"
After I had my doze they were whispering away like dried leaves in a paper bag. Then two of the characters started having sex. It wasn't meat platter sex or anything, but it was definitely unsuitable for a 12A certification. Plus the characters weren't exactly buff - looking at their bodies reminded me of those sad wrinkly balloons you find in a cranny two weeks after a party. Anyway, that was
waaaay too much for the whisperers, they got up and left. Presumably when they have sex they do it with the lights off, in two adjacent rooms.
In any case, I am not sure if it is a causal relation or anything, but after they left the film suddenly started being brilliant. It had that intensity that alters the way you look at things after leaving the cinema. So it definitely gets the
good rating.
Happy Christmas to anyone who is still reading.
