{"id":2802,"date":"2017-10-23T11:39:14","date_gmt":"2017-10-23T18:39:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/?p=2802"},"modified":"2017-10-23T15:49:31","modified_gmt":"2017-10-23T22:49:31","slug":"first-thoughts-viewing-blade-runner-2049","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/2017\/10\/first-thoughts-viewing-blade-runner-2049","title":{"rendered":"First thoughts after viewing Blade Runner 2049"},"content":{"rendered":"

My friend Brian and I viewed BLADE RUNNER (henceforth, BR2049) last Thursday. Our discussion, animated by a bit of delirium on my part (dehydration plus lack of sleep), helped to process my lingering combination of amazement and disappointment following end credits. (I’ll give a half-hearted spoiler alert now — the sort I’d appreciate before being invited to watch an official trailer. Not many if any spoilers, really.) I haven’t read anyone else’s thoughts yet and these thoughts below should be regarded as preparation before I jump into the fray.<\/p>\n

So, just to summarize, this BR2049 sequel extends the outline and details and mystery suggested in the original film, Blade Runner. I found this extension of that story to be less compelling, the philosophical questions in the original diminished through a quest to resolve some loose threads. Nevertheless, there remained something special in the film that deserves teasing out. Bear with me.<\/p>\n

Like CHINATOWN (1974), the original BLADE RUNNER (1982) is a story of a corrupt police force charged with cleaning up some of the mess of a morally incognizant mega-corporation. That mess is two-fold, one explicit (a slave rebellion of the autonomous and sentient artificial intelligences called Replicants) and the other presented more as a setting — an ecotastrophe on planet Earth in the wake of late Capitalism. Hyper-dense, concentrated urbanization in a southern California megacity (centered on Los Angeles) is shadowed by largely unpopulated wastelands extending outward from it, depopulated ring cities, and vast flood or oceanic dam walls. The focus is on the home world, while colonization of the solar system and outer-space continues apace.<\/p>\n

By BR2049, new generations of Replicants are preparing themselves, subversively, to recover to the best of their capability the ecologically damaged world that their creators have ravished and neglected. Their pointed concern for biological continuity is focused outward (by rebooting the life processes of living ecosystems) and inward (by taking ownership of their own means of reproduction). Humanity, on the whole, is too overwhelmed with its own inherited problems to notice these activities, but unsurprisingly, the mega-corp that created them does and seeks to exploit this development as a means of producing an inexpensive self-reproductive slave labor force.) And yet, as dominant and emotionally compelling as this theme should have been, the story-tellers get distracted by resolving other Deckard-related matters. (Enter Harrison Ford.)<\/p>\n

There is this one fascinating relationship, though. It feels like a throwaway given all the other action: it’s between Joe, the protagonist (Ryan Gosling, an artificial anthropoid, i.e., a Replicant) and his partner\/lover (Ana de Armas) — a holographic AI programmed explicitly as a companion\/sex worker, but which seems to have vastly outgrown its original programming. <\/p>\n

Joe and Joi’s relationship hints at something largely missing in BLADE RUNNER (1982), the existence of a personal reality. (Perhaps this is suggested by the mysterious unicorn sequences.) It’s a matter deeply important to Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?<\/em> (1968) from which the film was adapted — an intimate religious experience that simulates (or stimulates) a transformative experience of empathy in a world lacking it. This mystery religion — Mercerism — is engaged through an immersive virtual environment, and has the practitioner experience the suffering of a Sisyphus-like character named Mercer. Now, BR2049 never presents the relationship between Joe and Joi as anything like the masochistic experience as found in Do Androids Dream<\/em>. More similar are the traumatic childhood memories that tease forward Joe’s investigation for the truth of his self. Lacking in BR2049 is the sort of seepage of the “unreal” world into the real, through an experience or vision that questions the reliability of the narrator to themselves and to the audience — it’s an important trope of PKD’s novels. Here though the question of what is real and what is memory is completely rationalized, probably for the sake of the audience. The virtual realness of Joi is never really in doubt. Any possibility of mystery born of uncertainty is eliminated. Joe is a reliable witness and narrator, and if there is any mystery — it’s what is driving the film: Joe’s search for his origin. I think it’s here that PKD might yawn. One might critique Joe as a conventional male character, reducing his relationship with Joi to one where she, a conventional female supporting character, validates his development. I think this would be a shallow critique though, there is in this relationship something more. <\/p>\n

Both Joe and Joi’s aesthetics and gender expressions represent cishet fantasy norms for men and women. But since both of these characters are artificial, I imagine that Joe and Joi know and appreciate one another on a significantly different level which for the viewer is obscured by these norms. What is implied is that since, to humans, they are mere copies, Joe and Joi are disposable beings. It is their differentiation from a base copy — a process that is prompted through empathy responses — which gives their mortality (their capacity to be terminally shut off) some desperate value to each others ephemeral existence. (Meanwhile, it is the “miracle” of Replicant self-reproduction that inspires the major story arc of the film.)<\/p>\n

After this initial viewing, I felt, I feel, something strongly absent and lacking, and I think that it is in both the lack of mystery and the limited emotional connections to make with the “more human than human” characters through whom most of the story is told. There is very little uncertainty to wrestle with during or after the film that grounds the film in the mystery of whether this vile world is real or perhaps something else, Replicants and machinating evil corps included. The film leans very strongly on the aesthetic brilliance of the director and cinematographer. It is this throw-away character, neither human nor replicant, Joi — advertised product of cishet male fantasy — which lingers long after the story arc concerning Harrison Ford and his relationship with Replicants is resolved.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My friend Brian and I viewed BLADE RUNNER (henceforth, BR2049) last Thursday. Our discussion, animated by a bit of delirium on my part (dehydration plus lack of sleep), helped to process my lingering combination of amazement and disappointment following end credits. (I’ll give a half-hearted spoiler alert now — the sort I’d appreciate before being . . . → Continue reading: First thoughts after viewing Blade Runner 2049<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2803,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[284,285,166,283],"class_list":["post-2802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-film","tag-golems","tag-blade-runner","tag-philip-k-dick","tag-artificial-anthropoids","odd"],"yoast_head":"\nFirst thoughts after viewing Blade Runner 2049 • Aharon's Omphalos<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/2017\/10\/first-thoughts-viewing-blade-runner-2049\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"First thoughts after viewing Blade Runner 2049 • Aharon's Omphalos\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"My friend Brian and I viewed BLADE RUNNER (henceforth, BR2049) last Thursday. 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Varady","date":"January 13, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Amplified Harmonic Resonance, Playlist for Monday morning, 2009-01-12, programmer: dj Magical Adventures of Duffy Moon, 7am-1pm EST Year Artist Album Track No. Title 1989 Philip Glass 1000 Airplanes on the Roof 1 1000 Airplanes on the Roof 1989 Philip Glass 1000 Airplanes on the Roof 2 City Walk 2007 Christopher\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Music"","block_context":{"text":"Music","link":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/category\/art\/music"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2881,"url":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/2018\/05\/further-thoughts-on-prayer-as-media-and-praxis","url_meta":{"origin":2802,"position":2},"title":"Further thoughts on prayer as media and praxis","author":"Aharon N. Varady","date":"May 15, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"I would like to add to what many people are saying about the vacuous offering of \"thoughts and prayers\" after deliberate, predictable, and avoidable tragedies, without, I hope, sounding contrarian. Immersed as I've been for the last decade in prayer literature directing the Open Siddur Project, I want to say\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Prayer and Praxis"","block_context":{"text":"Prayer and Praxis","link":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/category\/yiddishkeit\/prayer-and-praxis"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/29496747_2038959703056685_7873941093962743808_n.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":62,"url":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/2006\/12\/thx-1138","url_meta":{"origin":2802,"position":3},"title":"THX-1138","author":"Aharon N. Varady","date":"December 7, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"I can forgive George Lucas for all of his late epic Star Wars prequels only because, only afterwards, did Lucas revisit his first film, the minimalist dystopia, THX -1138 (1971), correcting the audio artifacts that plagued the earlier video releases and making the soundtrack available on the DVD as a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Music"","block_context":{"text":"Music","link":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/category\/art\/music"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/12\/movie-thx1138.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1294,"url":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/2012\/07\/more-on-the-sia%e1%b8%a5-of-sua%e1%b8%a5-numinous-conversations-of-trees-and-other-vegetation","url_meta":{"origin":2802,"position":4},"title":"More on the sia\u1e25 of sua\u1e25: numinous conversations of trees and other vegetation","author":"Aharon N. Varady","date":"July 16, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"While working on some curriculum for the Teva Learning Alliance this summer, I was introduced to the Tseno Ureno, an amazing medieval commentary on the Torah by Rabbi Yaakov ben Yits\u1e25ak Ashkenazi (1550-1625). Here's Rabbi Yaakov Ashkenazi on Deuteronomy 20:19 -- \u05db\u05b4\u05bc\u05a4\u05d9 \u05d4\u05b8\u05bd\u05d0\u05b8\u05d3\u05b8\u05dd\u0599 \u05e2\u05b5\u05a3\u05e5 \u05d4\u05b7\u05e9\u05b8\u05bc\u05c2\u05d3\u05b6\u0594\u05d4. This is the verse from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mythology"","block_context":{"text":"Mythology","link":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/category\/yiddishkeit\/mythology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Sukkah-Italy-1374.-British-Library-MS-Or-5024-fol-70v.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Sukkah-Italy-1374.-British-Library-MS-Or-5024-fol-70v.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Sukkah-Italy-1374.-British-Library-MS-Or-5024-fol-70v.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Sukkah-Italy-1374.-British-Library-MS-Or-5024-fol-70v.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Sukkah-Italy-1374.-British-Library-MS-Or-5024-fol-70v.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":128,"url":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/2008\/05\/feeling-philo-for-philly","url_meta":{"origin":2802,"position":5},"title":"Feeling Philo for Philly","author":"Aharon N. Varady","date":"May 22, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"This last week I've been in Philadelphia, part of a three city trip to reconnect with friends, explore possibilities such as RRC and Penn's GSE-JRE, and stumble upon whatever serendipities the cosmos has placed before my blind third eye. Philadelphia is wonderful, by which I mean, it is full of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reports from the Front"","block_context":{"text":"Reports from the Front","link":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/category\/adventure"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2802"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2802\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2819,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2802\/revisions\/2819"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aharon.varady.net\/omphalos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}