Movies: What did You Watch Last Night?

[IAmBatman]

Watched Blade Runner last night on Netflix. I think it's a victim of the same thing Citizen Kane was for me. Really important, formative movie, that inspired a lot of other movies since. Which means I've already absorbed a ton of the good ideas of the movie in, frankly, slicker packages.

As a result, it ended up feeling outdated and unnecessarily slowly paced for me, with awkwardly inserted exposition, and characters it insisted I care more about than I ended up doing. It was solidly OK, but didn't match its reputation for me.

[Hahma]

If you saw it when it first came out, then it would have been much better. Sometimes it's harder for older movies to live up to the hype, especially now that special effects have become so much better over the past decade or so.

[IAmBatman]

Originally Posted by Hahma

If you saw it when it first came out, then it would have been much better. Sometimes it's harder for older movies to live up to the hype, especially now that special effects have become so much better over the past decade or so.

Exactly. And honestly not just special effects, but also narrative delivery style has changed. Modern audiences just don't tolerate things like voiceovers. We expect you to slyly slide important information into the dialogue and general plot progression of the film.

I think Blade Runner would've benefited a lot from Deckard teaming up with Rachel sooner so that the two could've simultaneously discussed the case without use of voiceover and formed a more convincing emotional bond.

Also, just some interesting anachronisms: Deckard reading a newspaper (who'd have predicted those would be so outdated now?), the surprisingly rapey love scene, an instance of yellow face (Roy with the big eyes and sticking his teeth out while using a racially charged voice) that would've never flown today, etc.

[Arch-vile]

I felt the same way about Blade Runner when I saw it a couple years ago. It's not a very exciting movie, though I feel a bit uncultured saying that.

I watched Dave and Children of Men over the weekend. Dave was funny and never tried to be stupid-funny, which I appreciated. The plot was strong as well. My only snaggle with it was the forced romance. Children of Men was a masterpiece. The cinematography was brilliant and the movie made me feel like I was right there in the war, bullets buzzing around me. I liked how the main characters felt so normal; too often in fiction all the events and characters revolve around the protagonists. In Children of Men, the protagonists were just unfortunately stuck in the middle of it all, which felt very realistic.

[japes]

Originally Posted by IAmBatman

Watched Blade Runner last night on Netflix. I think it's a victim of the same thing Citizen Kane was for me. Really important, formative movie, that inspired a lot of other movies since. Which means I've already absorbed a ton of the good ideas of the movie in, frankly, slicker packages.

Amazingly I've yet to see it myself, but feared the same results so haven't really tried. Though I still enjoyed Citizen Kane when I saw it last year.

To a lesser extent but same idea in the bolded portion above I watched Oblivion, Total Recall remake, and Elysium in a short period of time between Oblivion in the theater and Elysium released on Bluray and felt like I would rank them all differently if I watched them in the opposite order. I think I would have liked Elysium more had I not already seen the other two.

[quozl]

I was never a fan of Blade Runner and I saw it as soon as it hit home video.

But not liking Citizen Kane is a crime!

[IAmBatman]

Originally Posted by japes

Amazingly I've yet to see it myself, but feared the same results so haven't really tried. Though I still enjoyed Citizen Kane when I saw it last year.

To a lesser extent but same idea in the bolded portion above I watched Oblivion, Total Recall remake, and Elysium in a short period of time between Oblivion in the theater and Elysium released on Bluray and felt like I would rank them all differently if I watched them in the opposite order. I think I would have liked Elysium more had I not already seen the other two.

Yeah, tons of movies that pull from the same concepts as Blade Runner but do it with a bit more pizzaz. Fwiw, I liked Citizen Kane more as a movie, and didn't find it as slow as I found Blade Runner, it's just that I'd kind of seen the Citizen Kane style and substance before (including recently in The Aviator at that point).

[IAmBatman]

Originally Posted by quozl

I was never a fan of Blade Runner and I saw it as soon as it hit home video.

But not liking Citizen Kane is a crime!

I actually did like Citizen Kane, I just know that I would've liked it better had I not seen a lot of other movies inspired by its aesthetic and using its techniques first.

[quozl]

OK, no jail time then but you'll need to do some community service.

[TheAverageFan]

Originally Posted by Hahma

If you saw it when it first came out, then it would have been much better. Sometimes it's harder for older movies to live up to the hype, especially now that special effects have become so much better over the past decade or so.

That's exactly how I feel about the first Alien movie. That film's influence can be seen everywhere, and I can only imagine how audiences in 1979 must've reacted to seeing that kind of stuff back then. But the Xenomorph is common movie knowledge nowadays, so it was really hard to be scared of the unknown when said unknown is a pop culture icon.

Originally Posted by IAmBatman

Exactly. And honestly not just special effects, but also narrative delivery style has changed. Modern audiences just don't tolerate things like voiceovers. We expect you to slyly slide important information into the dialogue and general plot progression of the film.

Watch the director's cut (the Netflix version is the theatrical release). Ridley Scott fought against putting voiceover in the film and it detracts from the overall experience.

~TAF

[IAmBatman]

Yeah, but the Netflix version is already paid for.

Glad to hear that the voiceover is one thing different in the director's cut. I have heard that the director's cut is better on that one.

[Johngee]

Originally Posted by IAmBatman

Watched Blade Runner last night on Netflix. I think it's a victim of the same thing Citizen Kane was for me. Really important, formative movie, that inspired a lot of other movies since. Which means I've already absorbed a ton of the good ideas of the movie in, frankly, slicker packages.

As a result, it ended up feeling outdated and unnecessarily slowly paced for me, with awkwardly inserted exposition, and characters it insisted I care more about than I ended up doing. It was solidly OK, but didn't match its reputation for me.

Excellent points about Blade runner. Even though there is a DVD copy on the shelf behind me, I haven't seen it in YEARS. However, just because it is futuristic and Harrison Ford is in it, I'll always it as the Pre-Prequel prequel to the original Star Wars Tilogy as Han Solo's backstory (ha ha ha). This movie and "Ice Pirates" are two of my all time SciFi favorites.