Blade Runner 2008 Extended Edition

BR is my favourite film of all time. For years now, I’ve been trying to track down like so many others – different versions of this cult-hit. I’ve never decided whether I prefer the V/O or not, but I suspect I preferred the 92 directors cut as there was no happy ending and the unicorn scene made more sense for the ending.

With the arrival of the Final Cut – I thought we were going to see long lost deleted scenes put back in and a nice big correction and cleanup or certain things. Although I was still blown away watching the FC, I was left a bit dissapointed that Scott hadn’t put anything more in. It was just a clean up. Especially so, when I saw 45 mins of deleted and alternate scenes on the DVD’s.

Enter ADigitalMan with a cut for all tastes….well nearly anway. With the list of changes as above – this left me salivating. Downloaded and watched.

The nice thing here, is that he’s given you the option of V/O. Those who hate the dialogue can switch it off. Those who like can switch it on and there’s different version of the dialogue. I watched it with his ‘preferred’ dialogue, which adds much more Deckard narration, much more background into his character. I only noticed this go a bit strange in a couple places where the Vangelis score seems to repeat a couple bars. Sometimes Deckard seems to say something and repeat himself but in a different way….some of the narration doesn’t quite mesh – but I know this, I’m a fan. Someone watching this for the first time would never know. Plus you can watch it with the different narrations or not at all.

HOSPITAL SCENES!!!! YES!!!! The funny thing about these scenes, is that Holden makes Deckard to be a bit aloof, not altogether with it – the same thing can be said of an additional bar scene at Taffy Lewis’s.

Leon meeting Roy – much better than the previous re-used scene.

Leaving out the unicorn scene. To me, it makes no sense of the origami unicorn that Gaff leaves – I had no problem with it, but some other scenes point at Deckard being a rep here. He goes on about why a replicant would want photos and collect photos, while staring at his huge collection of photos. One of which comes to life, like Rachels. In a hospital scene, we see Gaff and Bryant watching Deckard on video as is they’re curious as to what he does. This scene makes it obvious how Gaff knows that Rachel is at Deckards apartment. Love the line ‘I spit on metaphysics Sir’. Fleshes out Gaff, changes his character.

We see Deckard wake after Rachel plays the piano…this had been left out previously.

Extended love scene – well, we get to see more skin – works for me!

Nice bit with Roy leaving the Tyrell Corporation, exclaiming ‘Mom?!’. There was line there that was in the Final Cut after Roy had killed Tyrell that would have been nice to leave in.

‘Are you sure you’re a man?’ Should have been in the Final Cut.

This cut, without using the Unicorn seems to me to say quite obviously that Dec is a rep. Let’s not forget the opening line from Rachel before credits “You know what I think? That we were made for each other.” It feels like a different film somewhat now. I don’t think it’s as dark as Scott’s Final Cut, but this feels like a more personal film in the world of Deckard. We hear his thoughts, he expresses his doubts and fears.

Technically, sound and picture are perfect. No harsh cuts, seemless.

5/5.

Wow 5/5, this is now my essential version! Thank you for making this! A great Fan edit!!

Added August 26, 2010

I have watched it a second time and wow, for the first time I have truly enjoyed Blade runner, thank you very much! If I would have one complaint, and its not to do with the edit but the movie itself, in my opinion changing the music in the two air car scenes would help tremendously; the synthesizer style music really hurts this masterpiece, but removing it would mean remixing the the scenes with new more appropriate music, adding chatter effects from radio and engine noise in the background. That seems like hard work! In any case, my favorite version yet! Thanks a lot!

So, some background. I last watched Blade Runner maybe six months ago, probably longer. I've only seen the Final Cut, and everytime I've watched it I've had distractions, such as chatting with a friend about unrelated matters, or checking my phone, or whatever else. I've always loved the asthetic of the film, that at least I would never forget, but I always regret when I watch films and let myself get distracted, missing all the important story. So I've been wanting to revisit the film without any distractions since then. But then I'd decide not to, and get lost trying to choose which version and whatnot.
Then I found this edit, and I don't think it was a bad decision to watch this as my first TRUE viewing of Blade Runner.
As someone who is easily distracted, having the option to listen to the narration was wonderful. I'd always heard that the narration was cheaply tacked on at the end of production because the company thought people would be confused by the plot, though reading up more on it, I'm not sure if it's that, or just to give an overall more Noirish feeling. Regardless, I'd heard it was bad, until the description of the edit said that the editor preferred it. So I watched the film with it, and I definitely prefer it as well. There are gaps without any dialogue, which I can see the appeal of for some hardcore fans, but as a simpleton, I sort of lose focus with too many moments like that, so the narration helped to fill the void, and also generally expand upon Deckard's character and the world.
Now, the narration is the only big thing I can comment on. There isn't a whole lot of the film that I remember from previous viewings, so any changes made didn't stand out. So actually, I suppose that's something to comment on, all the sources were blended together so perfectly that I couldn't tell what strayed from the main source. For this, I gave the editing top scores, because I had no idea what was edited differently.
Nothing major is removed, the plot is intact, and I see no reason why this shouldn't be recommended to any first time viewer, or long time fan. For all I care, this IS Blade Runner.