Please No, Not a Blade Runner Sequel 585
bowman9991 submitted a story that ought to make even the most stone-hearted amongst you cry. He says "Travis Wright, one of the writers behind Eagle Eye, has been working on a sequel to Ridley Scott's Sci-Fi classic Blade Runner. Script proposals have explored the nature of the off-world colonies, what happens to the Tyrell Corporation in the wake of its founder's death, and what would become of Rachel. Travis said he intends to write a script 'with or without anyone's blessings.' Director Ridley Scott appears interested in a sequel too. At Comic-Con in 2007 Ridley said, 'If you have any scripts, you know where to send them.' It's doubtful he'll have time anytime soon though. He's already stated his next two science fiction films will be an adaptation of Aldous Huxley's Brave New Word with Leonardo DiCaprio and an adaptation of Joe Haldeman's The Forever War."
Heinlein, please? (Score:5, Interesting)
Since Scott has a track record of putting out decent science fiction cinema, could we PLEASE get him to do some Heinlein? Or, if that's not "percussive" enough, some Niven-Pournelle? A shortened version of A Mote in God's Eye should have enough bang-bang to keep the kiddies happy, and cool aliens that turn from "advanced peaceful society" to "Freakish monster hoards" by the end.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Interesting)
Who knows, you may actually produce the next Memento, Reservoir Dogs, or Slumdog Millionaire.
You list three good original movies but I counter that there is so much more to them than just needed money to make. Look at the directors/writers: Christopher Nolan, Quentin Tarantino & Danny Boyle respectively. Now look at those three directors/writers names and notice how they rarely--if ever--attach themselves to bad projects. I think the three movies you listed were kind of like pet projects of these directors and there's not a lot of these great movies laying around just waiting to receive funding with the vision that these three movies you listed had.
You think you have a better idea but these studios have one directive: make money. And that's what they'll do & they'll do it better than you would. This isn't art, this is business. You aren't going to be taken seriously if you point Resevoir Dogs that made $147,839 on opening weekend in the states or Momento that made $235,488 on opening weekend in the states. Those amounts of money are a blip on the radar to what a franchise name makes them within three days.
Re:Already done. (Score:3, Interesting)
If this new movie bears twice as much relation to Blade Runner as Soldier did (fine movie, btw) then it can hardly do any harm to the original (even in our memories.)
Recommendation (Score:3, Interesting)
They say this like it's a positive recommendation or something. It's not.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Oh come off it. Sure both are about a gang of thieves and a jewelery heist with an undercover cop, just like Cloverfield and Godzilla are just movies of a town getting destroyed. If you've watched both Reservoir Dogs and City on Fire you won't come close to confusing the two. The way the stories are told are completely different and an important part of why the film is good.
Some scenes are pretty much the same as well in the movies, just like the car chase at the end of Death Proof was straight out of Vanishing Point. Not really a knock off, but you can see where it came from. Tarrantino isn't alone in doing that either.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Interesting)
"How about you devote all the energy, time, and effort that you would have put into doing yet another ill-advised sequel or remake into writing something ORIGINAL?"
Most of what is original isn't if you looked hard enough and had enough time. There are only so many themes that have wide enough commercial or financial appeal to a general audience. Where you can see this a lot is in video games: Early video games were much more original then later ones. People I think tend to forget that the expense of doing original stuff at the quality people today expect is a large part of the problem. That and lots of great stuff fails financially, lets face it, most people have average tastes. The further away you get from the average the smaller your audience because it is less widely appealing. Let's not also forget the marketing (or lack thereof) for many original works.
Re:Where can I get the VO DVD? (Score:3, Interesting)
Not sure if you need to do this to get it, but if you get the "Blade Runner Five-disk Ultimate Collector's Edition" (yes, that's really what it's called, and yes, I have it), it includes the original US theatrical release, with the voice-over.
I was never sure about the voice-over, myself. I saw that version first, in theatres, back in the day, and I thought the voice-over was annoying, a bit too "Magnum P.I.", clubbing me with context. When I saw the "director's cut" later on, I liked it better, but of course, I had already seen the first one, so I knew the context. It's easy to imagine that if you see the "director's cut" first, it'd be pretty confusing.
I do think there needs to be less voice-over, particularly towards the end. By that time, the context is established, and the awesome visuals really do work better on their own.
IMHO, obviously.
The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly was a sequel... (Score:3, Interesting)
Ain't nothing wrong with doing a sequel. "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" was the third movie in a trilogy, and was by far the best. It often takes several passes through a creative landscape before all the elements find their place and the whole thing jells.
Sequels don't have to have the same characters or plot. It can be enough to just take the basic idea and feel of the first movie, and run with it in a new direction.
For example, I'd love to see someone explore the idea of replication much deeper. What if Replicants weren't time-limited, but made perpetual instead? What if memory could be captured and re-implanted in one generation of Replicant after another, so that consciousness would span several lifetimes/bodies? What if anyone could make a copy of themselves, on demand? Say you want to try what it feels like to jump out of an airplane -- without a parachute. Do you make a replica, and then toss yourself?
A sequel doesn't have to be bad....
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:4, Interesting)
Like CG and hi-def are a requisite for creating art? I don't think so, it may be your requirement for viewership but that's a different issue altogether. There are plenty of hi-quality films that utilize little-to-no CG and frankly basic CG is doable on a desktop computer. Am I going to be able to render a highly complex scene? Of course not but that isn't within the scope of my aspirations at the moment, and don't take my word on any of this. But I think Robert Rodriquez is a bit more credible than me. If you happen to own the collectors edition of Sin City there are some great interviews with Mr. Rodriguez talking about his career and his approach, and he argues that aspiring filmmakers have access to every tool they need to make high quality films.
You don't need multiple cameras to do multiple angles on a single shot, you just need to do the scene multiple times. Does it open the door to continuity errors? Of course it does, but continuity errors are always going to be something to contend with so what's it really matter? The consumer level software is not prohibitively expensive and both Vegas and i Movie will put together a film, and with some options. It ain't studio work, but if your editor is talented it still looks good. Vegas costs next to nothing and is used in production houses for certain areas of work. You don't need top of the line equipment to create quality, you need top of the line equipment to make a studio picture but studio pictures rarely are for anything but entertainment.
And I can get a camera right now for $1200 that is considered, among idie film makers to be a very good camera. I can then go get the other equipment I need for the other $800. I'm not saying these prices are for new equipment but the used market is there...
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Interesting)
According to the IMDB FAQ [imdb.com] there seems to be some disagreement on this:
Personally I can't think of any Tarantino movie I'd call "original" though some of them I find reasonably amusing.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:5, Interesting)
Blade Runner made $4,749 average per theater opening weekend, which in inflated dollars (as of 1992 when Reservoir Dogs opened) is $6899.50, less than Quentin Tarantino's pet project, per theatre.
However it went on to gross 32m over it's lifetime (domestically), but cost 14m to make. At release it was considered a spectacular failure.
Theater by theater RD was more profitable. I don't believe that the idea that Ridley Scott would make this his pet project and do it right is very far fetched at all. The bar is set pretty damn high though... The effects STILL look good, the acting was great, and the music is out of this world. It's a stunning, hypnotic film. I have the director's cut and still watch it periodically.
One of the most beautiful movies ever made... I have the feeling that the only way a sequel would get made is if Ridley Scott financed it. No studio in their right mind would touch it, as is often the case with the most worthwhile movies.
-Viz
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Terminator 3 was made without James Cameron and IMHO, was an entertaining movie that continued the story in an interesting way. I avoided it for a long time for this same kind of reason -- not made by the originator, but eventually watched it on DVD and liked it. (Not as much as the previous two, but still very entertaining.)
There's also "Terminator Salvation" coming out this year and oh my god Terminator 5 already scheduled for 2011. We can't know how good these are of course.
I also think that the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles TV show has been very entertaining.
So it's not *impossible* that this could be a good sequel.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Reminds me of an interesting story. An episode of Diagnosis Murder needed a scene of a motorcycle crash, but the budget was not enough for a location shot... so Dick Van Dyke went home, turned on his Amiga, and did the crash in CG. [jimhillmedia.com]
Is a Good Blade Runner Sequel Possible? (Score:3, Interesting)
What would it take to make a good (or even great) Blade Runner sequel?
The original became a cult hit mainly because (a) it had an interesting, well textured setting (b) it projected a very clear style or mood that fit well with (c) an interesting moral question about what makes one "human" that is ultimately left up to the viewer, (d) while including enough action directly related to the question to keep it interesting on first viewing.
I think a good sequel would need to (a) replicate and build on the setting (b) choose a DIFFERENT question, or perhaps deeper examination of the original moral question to examine; and (c) fit the style/mood to that examination - and of course (d) driving it all with some cool action scenes.
Forget the off-world colonies - it's far more interesting to look at how alien Earth would have become, to our eyes. The original looked at an organic mix of decaying remnants of today's cities threaded and overshadowed by ultra-tech future stuff, and invaded by "foreigners" (apparently many natives having moved on to the off-world colonies?) OK, what is happening elsewhere? We saw a city apparently sapped by climate turned hot and wet - global warming has run amuk.
How's that affecting the rest of the country/world? Drought-ruined farm lands? Chicago by an empty Great Lakes basin (water mostly diverted to the new agricultural band across Canada, just a few big pipelines running to the city), surrounded by dusty desert, maybe growing food in towers? Ice age in Europe? London flooded? Expanding seas flooded the Mediterranean and turned lots of cities into Venice equivalents (and sunk Venice itself)? But now a dam is built across the Straits of Gibraltar - generating power as water is let in to replace evaporation, but not letting the sea fall to it's old levels? Has there been a mini-nuke-war in the middle east or maybe Pakistan-India? Those sorts of things would be interesting to look at. (And the nuke war assumption, shown in a few quick scenes, might serve as a warning to today's bickering countries with nukes or ambitions.) Instead of sitting in one city, the sequel should get out and around the world.
What interesting moral question might be examined? How about a serious re-examination of Hollywood's constant droning "it's good to age and die" formula? Perhaps the hero is struggling to put together enough money to replace his failing synth-organs, even as he moves through the richest and poorest levels of society? How about effectively immortal wealthy parents who keep their kids "young and innocent" - a 43 year old kid that looks 7 leading a secret life while playing a role to keep the parents happily self-deceived? Hmm - that edges on "What is adulthood? What is perversion? Is it more perverse to "force" someone to be a child forever, or for that "child" to behave as the adult they mentally are? [It doesn't have to turn the movie into child-porn - create a scenario in which a "straight-adult" hero is tempted but resists out of old-fashioned moral scruples he's not sure really apply any more - controversial enough.]
Maybe have the hero be someone arriving back from the off-world colonies, so we see this strange new world through his eyes - the tech is mostly not strange to him, but the culture would appear involuted and perverted, coming from a more straight-forward off-world culture where kids grow up fast because they're needed.
Re:I've got a better idea (Score:4, Interesting)