While researching Scott's career I find it strange that the now legendary failed film project of bringing Frank Herbert's epic novel "Dune" to the screen by eccentric filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky seems to intersect with Ridley Scott's early film career more than once.
"Alien" script writer Dan O'Bannon worked on Alejandro Jodorowsky's Dune project in Paris for six months.
This experience introduced O'Bannon to several artists whose work made a real impression on him, Chris Foss, Jean "Moebius" Giraud & H. R. Giger. O'Bannon then introduced Ridley Scott to H.R. Gigers work which became key to the aesthetic of Scott's smash hit "Alien".
Then after the collapse of Jodorowsky's "Dune" Italian/American film producer Dino De Laurentiis was able to buy the film rights for "Dune" and as part of this new contract author Frank Herbert was appointed as a technical advisor. Herbert was also commissioned to write a script. Immediately after the release of "Alien" (1979) Dino De Laurentiis hired Ridley Scott to direct "Dune". (Lets just take a moment and think about that and what could have been)
So in late 1979 Scott and a production team moved into offices at Pinewood Studios in England and began pre-production on a film adaptation of "Dune".
"I was attracted to Dune because it was beyond what I’d done on Alien which was kind of hard-core kind of horror film and Dune would be a step very strongly, very very strongly, in the direction of Star Wars."
Ridley Scott – “Dangerous Days” Documentary
H.R. Giger sitting in his "Harkonnen chair" he designed for Ridley Scott's Dune.
Scott teamed up again with H.R. Giger who was commissioned to create concept art and storyboards for the project.
The cracks started to show in the production when Frank Herbert delivered a 175-page script and after it was read it was deemed not fit for purpose. Scott reached out to legendary speculative fiction author Harlan Ellison to write the script but he passed on the project. Scott decided to tackle the script himself working alongside screenwriter Rudolph Wurlitzer who is best known for writing "Two-Lane Blacktop"(1971) & "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid "(1973) it is fair to say the pair did take liberties with the plot and when Herbert saw their script he was not happy sighting they had overly simplified the plot.
Finally, after eight months of work, Scott and Wurlitzer had what they considered to be a workable draft of the script and the production had been costed at $50m ($190m in 2024) but unfortunately De Laurentiis and Universal Studios were not impressed deeming the project too expensive. The project was rapidly becoming an unworkable headache and then Ridley Scott's older brother Frank Scott passed away unexpectedly. In the summer of 1980 Ridley walked away from the Dune project.
Another Sci-Fi novel that seemed to be desperate to be adapted for the big screen was Philip K. Dick's 1968 dystopian story "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?"
In the very early 70's a young New York based filmmaker named Martin Scorsese was keen to secure the film rights to the book but was unsuccessful. Imagine what that would have been like!
Film producer Herb Jaffe did option the book in the mid 70's and got his own son Robert Jaffe to adapt the novel and create a draft script.
Phillip K. Dick was not impressed with this attempt saying that when Robert flew to Santa Ana to meet with him,
"the first thing I said to him when he got off the plane was, 'Shall I beat you up here at the airport, or shall I beat you up back at my apartment?'"
In 1977 a TV actor turned screenwriter named Hampton Fancher adapted Dick's novel and had written a draft script and had been shopping it around when it came to the attention of English film producer Michael Deeley most notable for producing "The Italian Job" (1969) & "The Deer Hunter" (1978) who became very keen on making this film a reality remember this was Hollywood post "Star Wars" (1977) and sci-fi was back on film execs radar in a big way. Deeley approached Ridley to direct based on his roaring success with "Alien" (1979) but Scott passed on the project.
Having left the Dune project and dealing with the loss of his older brother Frank, Ridley wanted a project to sink his teeth into to distract him from his grief and get his career back on track, luckily Deeley was still looking for a director willing to take on the
"Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" production.
Ridley Scott signed on the dotted line and came onboard on the 21st of February 1980.
Now with Scott at the helm "Filmways" who was financing the film increased the budget from $13 million to $15 million.
Fancher's script was more focused on environmental issues where Phillip K. Dick's novel put themes such as what makes you human and religious philosophy front and centre. Scott was now at the helm and he wanted changes. First of all was the title. While thinking of an alternate title Fancher saw a cinema treatment which was written by William S. Burroughs for Alan E. Nourse's novel "The Bladerunner" (1974),
The cover read "Blade Runner" (a movie). Scott liked the name, so producer Michael Deeley obtained the rights to the title. Ridley Scott also wanted a thorough rewrite to be done on the script bringing back themes from Dick's novel that had been lost.
Scott hired screenwriter David Peoples for the rewrite so Hampton Fancher quit the project! He did eventually calm down and returned to contribute additional rewrites to the script. Once they had the rewritten script pre-production could go full steam ahead or full smog, rain and neon ahead!
Blade Runner (1982)
Directed by Ridley Scott, Screenplay by
Hampton Fancher & David Peoples,
Based on the novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" by Philip K. Dick Produced by Michael Deeley, Music by Vangelis, Cinematography by Jordan Cronenweth, Edited by Terry Rawlings & Marsha Nakashima, Starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, Edward James Olmos, M. Emmet Walsh, Daryl Hannah, William Sanderson, Brion James & Joe Turkel.
Rick Deckard is forced by his former boss police supervisor Bryant to return to old job as a Replicant Hunter "Blade Runner".
His assignment: to track down and eliminate four Replicants who have escaped from the off-world colonies and came to Earth.
The company "Filmways" who were onboard funding the production who had just spent over $2.5 million developing the project completely withdrew their financial backing.
The production was at the stage where they were about to start principle photography and they lost their budget! This is the kind of disaster that should be your producer's time to shine!
In ten days producer Michael Deeley managed to secure $21.5 million in financing via a complex three-way deal with Alan Ladd Jr. of "the Ladd Company" the Hong Kong-based producer Sir Run Run Shaw of "Shaw Brothers" fame and Tandem Productions who were a TV production company famous for making sitcoms such as "All in the Family", "Sanford and Son" & "Diff'rent Strokes".
When it came to casting the film finding the right actor for the lead role of Rick Deckard was obviously key. The original scriptwriter Hampton Fancher had been imagining actor Robert Mitchum in the role as he wrote the dialogue but Mitchum was 65 in 1981.
Beleive it or not Ridley Scott and Michael Deeley spent months meeting and discussing the role with Dustin Hoffman who eventually departed over differences in "vision".
According to existing production notes and documents actors who were being considered for the role of Deckard included Gene Hackman, Sean Connery, Jack Nicholson, Paul Newman, Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Peter Falk, Nick Nolte, Al Pacino and even Burt Reynolds. pretty wild stuff!
We all know Harrison Ford ultimately landed the role. Ford was chosen for numerous reasons, including his performance in and the fact he was associated with the Star Wars films, Scott had spoken with Steven Spielberg who was finishing up "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and strongly praised Ford's performance in and work ethic during the production of the film. Harrison Ford was familiar with the novel and had a genuine interest in the Blade Runner story. Following his success in Star Wars he was actively looking for a dramatic role with depth to avoid type casting.
One role that Ridley Scott had no problem at all casting was the leader of the replicant gang Roy Batty. Ridley cast Dutch actor Rutger Hauer in the role with no audition. Scott didn't even have a meeting with him before offering him the part.
Ridley had seen Hauer in the films of Dutch director Paul Verhoeven "Turkish Delight" (1973), "Katie Tippel" (1975) & "Soldier of Orange" (1977) he just knew he was right.
When asked about the casting of Hauer as Batty the author Philip K. Dick said
"the perfect Batty – cold, Aryan, flawless".
When he was writing the draft script screenwriter Hampton Fancher imagined his then girlfriend actress Barbara Hershey in the role of Rachael in the film. In the story Rachael is a replicant but is implanted with the memories of a deceased person causing her to believe she is human and becomes the love interest of Deckard. I do not know if Hershey was actually considered for the role but actress Nina Axelrod did audition (amusingly Axelrod was the wife of Robert Jaffe the man who wrote the "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" script that was so bad Philip K. Dick wanted to fight him)
The 22 year old actress Sean Young was cast as Rachael. Young had trained as a ballet dancer and had been working as a model before pursuing a career in acting. She had appeared in two small roles in films before landing this role in Blade Runner.
"Pris" is one of the rouge replicants that Deckard needs to "retire" she is described as a "basic pleasure model". Ridley apparently offered the role to singer/ songwriter, actress Debbie Harry with no audition but she declined his offer.
Scott screen-tested several hopefuls until he saw Daryl Hannah.
Hannah had studied acting and dance at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles and made her film debut in Brian De Palma's horror film The Fury (1978) Blade Runner was her third film role.
She is wonderful in the role.
Blade Runner is packed with fantastic actors in remarkable roles but this blog is already going to be epic but I would just like to highlight Joe Turkel the actor who plays Eldon Tyrell CEO of the Tyrell Corporation the manufacturer of replicant humans.
Turkel was an American character actor who worked prolifically in film and during the Golden Age of television in the 50s & 60s. He regularly appeared in the creature features of filmmaker Bert I. Gordon (that's a blog for another day) but most notably he regularly worked with the genius Stanley Kubrick, he appeared in "The Killing" (1956), "Paths of Glory" (1957) and most notably "The Shining" (1980) in which he played Lloyd the bartender who was either a ghost, a figment of Jack Torrance's imagination or both.
This film like all films is a team effort being orchestrated by the director, some of the stand out talent that really made this film the masterpiece that it is include,
Syd Mead was an American industrial designer and neo-futurist concept artist who was employed to design the look of Blade Runner. The buildings, vehicles and props all the things that help bring the world to life.
Mead's designs were fundamental not only to the aesthetic of Blade Runner but shaped how generations of people envision the future.
He was a genuine industrial designer and designed cars for Ford, the look of electrical products for Philips Electronics in the 60's he worked extensively with steel and cement companies making concept art of "buildings of the future!" showing what could be achieved with modern building materials. This was the age of projects like Century City in LA where in post war america they wanted buildings that looked like something out of a Buck Rodgers comic.
In addition to "Blade Runner" Mead was responsible for the design of so much in sci-fi cinema.
He designed the character 'Johnny 5' in the "Short Circuit" films, He designed so much in "Tron" (1982) including the famous 'Light Cycles'.
George Lucas created the 'AT-AT' for his Star Wars saga based on concept art by Mead. He also worked on films such as "Star Trek: The Motion Picture"(1979), "Aliens"(1986), "Timecop" (1994), "Johnny Mnemonic" (1995), "Mission: Impossible III" (2006), Tron: Legacy (2010), "Elysium" (2013), "Tomorrowland" (2015) & "Blade Runner 2049" (2017).
Jordan Cronenweth was an American cinematographer. Born and bred in Los Angeles, California he even attended North Hollywood High School. He graduated from Los Angeles City College, majoring in Engineering. While he was at college he interned as a film lab assistant at Columbia Pictures and got the opportunity to work as a camera operator on the musical film "Oklahoma!" (1955). He began working as a cinematographer in 1969 and during his career he contributed to some truly remarkable films collaborating with some truly great directors including Robert Altman, Billy Wilder, Jonathan Demme, Ken Russell, Francis Ford Coppola & Ridley Scott. He photographed films such as the brutal revengomatic Rolling Thunder (1977), the mind bending "Altered States" (1980), the neo-noir "Cutter's Way" (1981), The true cult
Sci-fi classic "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension" (1984) and he was nominated for an Oscar for his work on "Peggy Sue Got Married" (1986). He also shot one of the, if not the greatest concert films of all time Talking Heads "Stop Making Sense" (1984) directed by Jonathan Demme which was recently restored and released in 4K.
But it was his exceptional work on Blade Runner that earned him the reputation as one of the greatest and most influential cinematographers of all time. His flair for heavily textured, Neo noir photography being totally contemporary yet evoking the golden age of cinema is a huge part of why Blade Runner is just so visually stunning.
Jordan Cronenweth was six weeks into shooting "Alien 3" (1992) when he became very ill and had to leave the project. He went on to develop Parkinson's disease and passed away in 1996 at the age of 61.
His son Jeffrey Cronenweth is now a gifted cinematographer who has been working since 1999 he has been nominated for two Oscars and has worked with David Fincher, Kathryn Bigelow & Sam Taylor-Johnson among others and shot "Fight Club" (1999), "One Hour Photo" (2002), "The Social Network" (2010), "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" (2011) & "Gone Girl" (2014).
Vangelis was a Greek musician, composer, and producer who specialised in electronic, progressive, ambient, and classical orchestral music. Vangelis began his music career in the 1960s as a member of the bands "The Forminx" and "Aphrodite's Child". In the 1970's he settled in Paris and garnered attention and recognition for scoring a series of wildlife documentary films made by the filmmaker Frédéric Rossif. In the mid 1970's he relocated to London, England and constructed his own recording facility "Nemo Studios" and went on to release a string of successful and influential albums enjoying commercial success globally for about 20 years. He won the Academy Award for Best Original Score for Chariots of Fire (1981) which was directed by Hugh Hudson and went on to score "Blade Runner" (1982)
In his career Vangelis recorded 23 studio albums and scored 11 films.
He was a very private person and did not really seek "Fame" he just needed to create music.
he once said.
"that success and pure creativity are not very compatible. The more successful you become, the more you become a product of something that generates money"
Vangelis passed away on 17 May 2022, at the age of 79, at a hospital in Paris Due to complications after he contracted COVID-19.
When Ridley Scott, Syd Mead, Jordan Cronenweth, Vangelis and all the talented technicians, crafts people & performers get together... you get this!
There is so so much more to talk about when it comes to this film but I need to wrap up...
"Blade Runner" was released on the 25th of June, 1982 in the US.
When it was released it received a mixed reception from film critics.
I constantly seem to be writing about how critics do not appreciate some of the greatest films ever made when they were released.
In 1982 "Blade Runner" was described by critics as being too slow. Sheila Benson from the Los Angeles Times called it "Blade Crawler", Pat Berman in The State and Columbia Record described it as "science fiction pornography" using the word pornography to indicate something that has no artistic value. A glimmer of hope is seen in a review printed in Ares Magazine at the time which said "Misunderstood by audiences and critics alike, it is by far the best science fiction film of the year."
Unfortunately this "Misunderstanding" was one of the factors that affected the film's performance at the box office. The other was a simple case of "choice overload" in the post "Star Wars" (1977) world a glut of Sci-Fi and fantasy films were given the green lite so theatrically Blade Runner was competing against "John Carpenter's The Thing", "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" and "Conan the Barbarian" and all of these films were up-against Steven Spielberg's "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" which was a box office Juggernaut and cultural phenomenon.
The film ended up costing $30m ($98m in 2024) plus there would have been a large spend on advertising it only grossed $41.8 million at the box office. Remember only a percentage of that comes back to the production so it is fair to say the myriad of the film's financiers did not see a return on their investment during the films theatrical run. However the film was released on Betamax and VHS in 1983 and I am sure with home rentals and sales of the film in its various forms and television rights the film has been incredibly profitable over the last 20+ years.
With its release on physical media in the 80s the film rapidly developed the cult following it deserved. As with so so many films it has now been "Critically reappraised".
The film is now widely regarded as one of the best Sci-Fi films of all time and one of the best films ever. Few films have made such a huge and indelible mark on pop culture as Ridley Scott's mysterious, neo-noir, cyber-punk, science fiction masterpiece.
"Blade Runner" (1982)
Was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1993
On the 2022 Sight & Sound Critics Poll it was voted to be the 54th greatest film ever
On the 2022 Sight & Sound Directors Poll it was voted to be the 62nd greatest film ever
and features on almost all great and best movie lists.
The film is rated 4.1/5 on Letterboxd, 8.1/10 on IMDb, 89% on Rotten Tomatoes, 91% on the Popcornmeter and Metacritic, assigned the film a score of 84 out of 100 based on 15 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".
It has become "Cool" to not like Blade Runner just like its "Cool" to say The Beatles are overrated. It's always funny seeing a lukewarm review written by a hipster which still ends with 3.5 out of 5 because the film is just truly great.
There is just so much to talk about when it comes to this film but I knowingly avoided a lot of the common talking points.
End of Part 3.
