Blade Runner

[lokifan]

I only saw Blade Runner when I was 24, in 2014, so maybe that’s why, but my main reaction to it was “I heard so much ‘is he or isn’t he a Replicant?’ and nobody ever mentioned Harrison Ford’s character STRAIGHT-UP RAPES Rachel?????”

Comments

[mtbc]

Watching it now, that really is an outstanding scene in that I wish it were not there at all, it's not like the plot hinges on it; I love much of the rest of the director's cut but that part's a big exception.

(It's even more unpleasant in A Clockwork Orange but at least that has some narrative excuse.)

[lokifan]

Yeah, A Clockwork Orange I haven't seen, but I have read the book, and yeah I don't think it'd necessarily need to be gratitious in how it's filmed but it does exist to be brutal - that's the narrative point. Part of what made me go "!!!" in Blade Runner was that everything, including her affect the next morning, made me feel like this was unambiguously a rape scene and then the film turned out to not know that.

[elfflame]

It's my biggest problem with the film. :S

[lokifan]

I was really surprised I'd never heard it mentioned, having learnt so much about the film through cultural osmosis before seeing it.

[elfflame]

I could go on a rant, but I'll just say that it's part of the patriarchy. It's a guy's movie, so apparently it's not a big deal. Unfortunately. At least, that's my take on it.

[selenak]

Supposedly when watching the rough cut someone observed "that's not a love scene, that's a hate scene", but there it remained anyway, with the fact that the actor and actress loathed each other being blamed for how it comes across. Who knows, could be true; imagine, say, the contemporary scene between Han and Leia from Empire Strikes Back where he backs her into a corner during their repairs of the Falcon while trying to get her to admit she's attracted to him just played differently by the actors, same dialogue, same blocking, and you get something that's quite similar. It's the fact that there's chemistry and that Carrie Fisher plays it in a way that makes it clear to the audience Leia a) is in fact attracted to Han, and b) could, if she wanted to, make mincemeat out of him, and of course that Harrison Ford acts playfully here, that sells it as "scene of sizzling UST" not "attempted sexual molestation".

All of which goes to say: in Blade Runner, script wise, Rachel is supposed to be in love with Deckard, and vice versa. It's very much not how it comes across on screen.

(In the recent sequel, they lean heavily on Rachel/Deckard as the romance of the ages, and yeah, no. If Blade Runner sells any romance, it's Pris/Roy.)

[ruuger]

Oh, that's a very good way of putting what's wrong with the scene, and explains why I hated it as a teenager even though I loved Han/Leia (and was a massive Harrison Ford fan)

[lokifan]

Oh, interesting re: hate scene and the fact that they hated each other! Because you're absolutely right - part of what startled me was actually how much it seemed like one of those sorts of scenes, like Han/Leia or a bunch of others, but in this one she never had the moment where she smiled or started kissing him back passionately or whatever. She just seemed frightened and then resigned, and he seemed furious. It could've been played in a really different way. And then how she is the next morning would've seemed purely about the whole Replicant situation.

It's wild to me that it was then played as a great love in the sequel!!!

[elisi]

THIS THIS THIS

I can't remember when I first watched it, but we re-watched it a few months ago and just... no.

Also it answers the question of whether a 'robot' can be raped. The answer is yes. :(

[ruuger]

I first saw Blade Runner when I was 13, I think, and though it's one of my all-time favourite movies, even my teenage Harrison Ford obsessed self was totally creeped out by that scene (which is why it's never been one of my favourite Harrison Ford movies).