Last week Warners announced their plans for the upcoming rerelease of the Blade Runner “Director’s Cut” and the release of the “Final Cut,” both theatrically and on DVD. Blade Runner will see the “Director’s Cut” cleaned up and reformated for the DVD format, and then the “Final Cut” will present director Ridley Scott’s true Director’s Cut. (The 1992 “Director’s Cut” wasn’t actually a director’s cut–film buffs had discovered Scott’s workprint, sans Harrison Ford’s narration and Vangelis’ score, and Warners tweaked it a little bit, adding the unicorn scene, to market it as a “Director’s Cut.”)
For this fan the exciting news is the release of the domestic and international theatrical cuts as part of the four-disc DVD set. Many fans hate the Harrison Ford narration in these original versions, while I think it lends a certain film noir charm to Blade Runner. It’s nice to see that the original form of Blade Runner hasn’t been forgotten. 🙂
It was never a matter of Warner Brothers not wanting to release it, the rights had been tied up by the Ladd Company for the past several years all over a pissing contest between them and Ridley Scott. I’m not sure what happened (because the Ladd Company is still around), but I’m glad the differences were finally ironed out.
I’ll be glad to have the different versions available. I prefer the version without the voiceover, myself, and I’m a big film noir fan.
What I’m worried about is that Ridley Scott will tweak the movie so that Deckard is clearly and unambiguously a replicant himself, which Scott apparently believes now. That would be giving up the point of the movie to get a shot of cheap irony, in my opinion. Ambiguity is fun but if Deckard’s a replicant his growth in the movie, as he realizes that replicants are capable of acting more empathetically than the humans who use and kill them, is lost. I could go on but I was already thinking about blathering about this at my lj.
Hmm..and I just the other day got a dvd transfer of the Criterion Laser DisK version.
Just like I just aquired the D&D cartoons to then learn they’re being released on DVD in the near future.