Blade Runner 2049: Seen it (Open Spoilers after the first post)

Cafe Society
1

Just got back from a sneak preview. Unusually for me, I went into this blind. I’m a huge fan of the original, and when I heard they were making a sequel, my initial reaction was, “Why?” But a friend had a free ticket, so what the hell, right?

Holy shit that was good.

I don’t know that you’ll see a more beautiful film this year. It’s definitely drawing on the original - and to be honest, I could watch two hours and forty minutes of just flying cars swooping around urban dystopias - but it also nails the sense of emptiness and abandonment that defined the novel.

The story is good, too, but hard to talk about without getting into spoilers, so I’ll continue this in the next post.

2

Ford and Gosling are both fantastic in this. I didn’t have much of an opinion on Gosling one way or the other before this, but he’s amazing in this. The role requires a very flat affect, which he nails, while still silently communicating a tremendous humanity. He invests you completely in a character that, at least initially, doesn’t even view himself as a person. It’s a hell of a trick.

As for Ford; the scene towards the end, in Wallace’s office, when he meets the “new” Rachel, is some of the best acting he’s done in years. Maybe ever. The heartbreak in his face, as it moves in and out of shadow, with the water reflections on the wall behind him - I was transfixed.

The plot overall was smart and sophisticated, and grew organically from the original movie without retreading the same ground. I was constantly second guessing things that happened, only to have the story completely justify it a few minutes later. When K finally goes to meet Deckard, I was thinking, “Okay, this is visually striking, but they’ve gone too far. What American city is going to have a bunch of giant hooker statues standing around?” And then he walks into a casino with a holo-Elvis, and I’m all, “Oh, yeah, Las Vegas. That makes total sense.”

At over two and a half hours, there’s a lot of movie here. Despite its length, there’s so many little scenes that in another film would have been cut to trim the length down. The bit towards the end, when K is propositioned by the giant naked hologram, doesn’t advance the plot at all, and could easily have been cut out to shave five minutes off the run time. But it’s an important emotional beat, and beyond that, such an amazing visual, and the film’s filled with little moments like this.

Lastly, if you were on the “Deckard is human” side of the Big Question from the original film, I think you’ll be pleased. The film deliberately avoids directly answering the question, but the explanation - that both Deckard and Rachel were made to be fertile replicants, and programmed to fall in love with each other as soon as they met - is too pointlessly convoluted. If Tyrell built both these replicants, and wanted them to reproduce, why hide one in a police department, in a highly dangerous job? Just decant them, lock them in a room together, and wait for them to start making repli-babies. I think Deckard pretty much has to be human for the plot in this one to work.

3

Loved it. Incredible visuals, and I actually dreamed about it after watching it - something that no movie has ever done to me.

I also thought they handled the “Is he or isn’t he?” debate really well.

I had to wonder how many people in this world are replicants? Seems that K was running into them all over the place.

4

I really liked it, but it didn’t need to be that long. Very slow, very visual, not plot driven. Definitely nails the feel of the original while not feeling out of date. Sit back and enjoy, but don’ expect things to happen very fast.

5

Anyone here see it on RPX, whatever that is? We’re having a debate here over whether it’s worth it in that format

6

Warning: not a fan.

I don’t know if it’s typical of all theaters or just where we saw it, but holy crap on a cracker, was it LOUD!!! I had to cover my ears many times - it was painful! Personally, I found the dark/shadow/fog/whatever overwhelmingly annoying.

I wasn’t all that crazy about the original, and I thought this movie was tedious. Bottom line, if my husband hadn’t wanted to see it, I wouldn’t have gone. Maybe I missed a lot of subtleties or something. The 3-D ads were a cool effect - especially when people walked thru the ballerinas’ feet. And I laughed when Deckard gave the dog a drink.

Definitely not the target audience, tho.

7

Wow, I thought it was amazing. One of the best sci-fi movies ever, even. Everything was good about it, but the design/setting was just incredible. As richly realized or more as franchises like Star Wars that have had ten times more content produced or more.

8

My buddy and I both cracked up a little when we saw that they had made San Diego a dump for LA. #sad!! :wink:

And I agree it was ridiculously loud, but I think that’s SOP for movies these days. I mean, there is no reason those flying cars would have to be that loud. I did plug my ears a few times just to try and avoid some potential hearing loss. But… I will say that the previews are typically louder.

9

For decades, people having been complaining that Deckard couldn’t be a Replicant because if they did want to make a Replicant into a Blade Runner, they’d make him as strong as the Replicants he hunts. And, in this movie… they did exactly that. K manages to overpower Sapper Morton even after being pounded through a wall. And, I loved it when Deckard tried to punch out K and… did about as well as he’s ever done when fighting a Replicant. :slight_smile:

The movie doesn’t reveal whether Deckard is or isn’t a Replicant… but if he is, he’s a physical level C. :slight_smile:

10

I saw it today in XD, which is Cinemark’s proprietary equivalent to IMAX, but did not see it in 3D. Good, but too long. (Someone asked in another thread about another SF movie; why make the robots/androids/artificial humans indistinguishable from real humans, especially when they need to quickly identify them as non-human.)

One question; how did K figure out that the woman in the bubble was the daughter?

11

I saw it last night, and this is a good summary of my impressions too.

I was a little late to the party on the first Blade Runner, so it didn’t have much of an impact on me. But this film is stunning. I didn’t mind the length at all, and found the pacing pitch perfect. It lingered when it needed to, and the dystopia had real weight. I had a real feeling of sadness and anxiety, and couldn’t help think of my own small children and what it would be like if a future like this was in store for them. Cold chills indeed.

I agree that the movie didn’t really explicitly address the “Deckard is a replicant” question, although the fight scene definitely did imply his strength wasn’t up to par. I’d argue that this film actually makes the question boring and irrelevant. It’s a minor plot detail in a film that deftly focuses on more compelling and resonant ideas.

Great performances, but the director, Denis Villeneuve, really hit it out of the park. With Arrival, Prisoners, and Enemy (I didn’t really understand this one but it still looked stunning and creeped me out) he’s made it to my “look out for and always watch” list.

12

I liked this aspect of it, because it was true to the original. From some of the previews, I worried it would be more of an action piece. While they certainly had action, this one still took the time to develop the mood.

He had confirmed that his memory really happened. Once he learned he wasn’t the one who experienced it, the only other option was that it happened to the woman who created replicants’ memories.

13

Thank you; that makes sense. I’m also wondering about the bee hives in Las Vegas. I assume they were replicants? Because there’s no flowers they could pollinate, so how could real bees survive?

14

I just saw it and loved it, and want to watch it again very soon. It was gorgeous, and had great acting, story, and everything. Also really great as a sequel, with continuing things and not retreading.

It was a very long movie, but I don’t know what I would have cut out. I could have happily sat through a longer version, but only if there was an intermission so I could have a quick restroom break.

I liked that emotional beat, with Joe missing Joi. That was an interesting part of the story, with a replicant in love with an intangible being.

I saw it in RPX and thought it was well worth it, and I would definitely recommend seeing it in the biggest, nicest format possible. It’s absolutely stunning. I wouldn’t pay the extra money for just any movie to be in the bigger format, but it’s well worth it for this.

I read a review that said if you liked the original you’ll probably like this one, and if you didn’t like the original you probably won’t like this one. That seems accurate to me. I’m going to be raving about the new one to all my friends, but also with the caveat that if you didn’t like the original, or if the trailer doesn’t interest you, it’s probably not the movie for you.

Maybe I’m jaded, but I didn’t think it was that oppressively loud. And I was at an RPX screening, so I would have thought it would have been even louder in that. Dunkirk was definitely a lot louder. There were definitely some quiet scenes that stood out because then I heard the air conditioning running in my theater.

15

I had to sit in the theater a while and collect my thoughts for a while. My immediate take was that it was an hincredible film; tremendously affecting. I am also p,eased to say that it was not at all what I would have guessed from the trailer. I wish Olmos would have spoken using much more of the language he invented for the first film. That’s about all I can find fault with at the moment.

I need to drive down to LA and see this in a good theater. I saw it at a local multiplex, in 3D. The projection equipment wasn’t quite up to the task. I had read that a risk of the 3d version was that if the image wasn’t bright enough, the darker scenes could lose all detail and it was true.

Anybody read anything about how they inserted Rachel into the movie?

16

Outstanding movie. I was particularly blown away by Ana de Armas, who played Joi. I’ll be keeping an eye out for her.

17

The filmmakers are apparently keeping that a secret for now. If it was done with CGI, then it was VASTLY better than the CGI characters in Rogue One. An actress named Loren Peta is credited as “Rachael Performance Double,” but she doesn’t look much like Sean Young.

18

I think the giant naked hologram was played by the same actress that plays his companion, Joi. So he stops because it’s basically Joi interacting with him again and his instinct is to stop and engage even though he knows it’s not the same program/AI that he had a relationship with.

19

Hell, I am the target audience. Movie sucked, mostly, IMHO, though there were a couple of interesting points–few and far between. The theater had no air conditioning, so the combination of tedious movie lacking plot coherence for first hour and a hot cinema in Seoul knocked me out three times in an hour. Left the movie after one hour.

Maybe if the management had cranked the sound up to unbearable, I could have stayed awake.

20

I absolutely agree that the trailer gives you the wrong impression about the film. Which I think is a good thing, because I found the trailer to be kind of confusing. I think mainly they wanted to show off some of the more spectacular special effects, and so just threw a bunch of snippets at us.