Audio Commentary with ‘Technical Crew’ including Lawrence G. Paull, David Snyder, Syd Mead, Douglas Trumbull, Richard Yuricich and David Dryer. To Be Human: Casting Blade Runner 2049 (HD 17:15) This is an interesting look at not just the casting of the major players but the numerous small roles that had recognizable actors but featured in small important ways. While this is being marketed to the UK, those in Region A will be pleased to know the 1080 disc played fine in my Region A player. In addition to Ford’s steady on-screen presence, Blade Runner features seminal performances by the likes of Rutger Hauer, Edward James Olmos, Sean Young, and Daryl Hannah, not to mention a host of fantastic character actors. The film’s production design was overseen by legendary futurist Syd Mead, giving it a highly unique visual style never-before-seen on the big screen. The film also includes a sparse but evocative score by composer Vangelis (more commercially known for his work on Chariots of Fire). But it’s the efforts of director Ridley Scott for which this film is perhaps best known. In the years since Blade Runner first dazzled and puzzled audiences around the world, a number of different versions of the film have surfaced. There’s the original theatrical cut, the international cut, the much sought-after (and seldom seen) “workprint,” and a 1992 director’s cut that wasn’t actually a director’s cut. Finally, in 2007 and some 25 years after the film’s debut, fans of Blade Runner finally had the chance to see it as its director intended.

that it almost breaks the illusion of scale. If the cityscape were any clearer, you'd see that it was

purposes the same disc, down to branding and menus, as Warner Brothers released a few years ago, and for an in depth analysis of the 4K's video From a character perspective, it's less successful. Robin Wright's Lieutenant Joshi spends most of her time speechifying, while Jared Leto's narcissistic Niander Wallace prattles on about Mankind's destiny. They're not bad performances, they're just clunkily written. unjustified. The review score for extras has been lowered accordingly, along with the overall score. Blade Runner has been extensively discussed in multiple venues over the last 35 years. Blu-ray.com's original

Editor’s Note: Portions of this review are excerpted from my longer review of the original Blade Runner: The Final Cut Blu-ray release from 2007 – you can read that here. Note that the Final Cut images below are photographs of the new 4K UHD presentation, projected with HDR. Don’t use them to judge color; it’s incredibly difficult to get color to reproduce accurately via a cellphone camera.] For the 4K enthusiast who can't wait to get a look at the Ultra HD Blu-ray release that's due on September 5th, take a look at my coverage of the film and the A/V presentation Here.

Picture Quality

Michael evidently was. That said, as always, Michael's analysis is thorough and insightful. I do want to clarify one aspect which may confuse some But it's a film full of many moments of breathtaking vision. You'd have to search far and wide to find a film from 2017 that's this well realised. While Blade Runner felt small and contained, 2049 aims for an epic and sweeping quality that's not far off David Lean's widescreen images. miscommunication in what our 4K and 2K scores should be for (the 2K score is for any included 1080 content), and as you can read in Michael's own But that’s also what makes Blade Runner so interesting. It’s not concerned with conventional storytelling. It’s a dreamy, meditative tale that ponders the nature of existence, human or otherwise, with frequent bouts of melancholy. In my review for The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, I opened by discussing the difficulties of discussing a classic piece of cinema. I face that conundrum again with Ridley Scott's 1982 film, Blade Runner. Over the last 35 years, Blade Runner has run the gauntlet of being considered an expensive indulgent failure to being one of the highest-regarded films in science fiction filmmaking. In those years, audiences have been witness to multiple releases, various versions of the film, as well as a fairly definitive restoration effort. It's been discussed, dissected, and digested leaving little room for me to add anything to the conversation beyond what it has meant for me in developing my appreciation of film.