Class #15 Literary Criticism

Today’s Menu I. Blade Runner II. White Noise III. Coda

Blade Runner By Ridley Scott (1982/1992)

Plot Summary (1) Runner The film describes a future in which genetically manufactured beings called replicants are used for dangerous and degrading work in Earth's “off-world colonies." Built by the Tyrell Corporation to be 'more human than human', the Nexus-6 generation appear to be physically identical to humans — although they have superior strength and agility — while lacking comparable emotional responses and empathy. Runner Runner Runner

Plot Summary (2) Replicants became illegal on Earth after a bloody mutiny. Specialist police units — blade runners — hunt down and "retire" (i.e., kill) escaped replicants on Earth. With a particularly brutal and cunning group of replicants on the loose in Los Angeles, a reluctant Deckard is recalled from semiretirement for some of "the old blade runner magic.“

The "Director's Cut" Released in 1992 The voice-over narration is excluded More mythological ambiguity is introduced (with the inclusion of a scene of a unicorn running through a forest) The finalé of an escape into nature is removed.

What’s left out Based on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) by Philip K. Dick It is never explained in the film that (1) most healthy humans have emigrated off a pollution-ridden Earth; only the sick ones stay home, such as the prematurely aging robotics expert, Sebastian (2) nearly all animals are extinct; most surviving animals are artificial. The movie makes reference to it notably in the android empathy test, where lack of sensitivity to animal life is a key clue to the androids' supposed lack of real feeling. (3) the possibility that Deckard himeself may be a "replicant"

Discussion Questions 1. What’s the major theme of the movie? 2. Describe the city landscape. Is it a postmodern city? Why or why not? 3. In what ways are the replicants “more human than human”? 4. What’s the function of memories in the film?

Genre Science fiction Dystopia Film noir cyberpunk

Film Noir Originally a French term (literally "black film"), now in common usage, to indicate a film with a gritty, urban setting that deals mainly with dark or violent passions in a downbeat way. Especially common in American cinema during the late forties and early fifties, its themes of existential alienation and paranoia have often been read as signs of postwar malaise and Cold War anxiety. (

Cyberpunk a sub-genre of science fiction that focuses on advanced technology such as computers or information technology, usually coupled with some degree of breakdown in the social order. The plot of cyberpunk writing often centers on a conflict among hackers, artificial intelligences, and mega corporations, tending to be set within a near-future Earth.

Postmodern City?

Metropolis

Gotham City in Batman Returns

Traffic also takes to the sky in this filthy, rainy, and dark Los Angles of

oculture/pomosf.html

The high-tech future of a polluted planet being abandoned for off-world colonies and the remaining society run as a police state.

Capitalism

en/thumb/0/04/BladeRunner_Spinner_Billboard.jpg/550px- BladeRunner_Spinner_Billboard.jpg

An Advertisement “A new life awaits you in a golden land of opportunity. It's a chance to begin again. Let's go to the Colonies!”

Characters

Rick Deckard

Roy says to Deckard: "Quite an experience to feel fear. That's what it's like to be a slave."

Is Deckard a replicant? There are two main reasons for this: 1 that his minder, Gaff, seems to know about his dream of the unicorn. He leaves an origami unicorn outside Deckard's flat and could only know about the dream if it had been implanted 2 Deckard refuses to reply to Rachel's question "Did you ever take the test yourself?“

origami

Roy Batty: Satan or Christ?

Roy celebrates his memories: “I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.” csdaily/csdart/images/ August/Blade%20Runner%20- %20Roy%20dove%20(200w).jpg

The characters are surrounded by genetically engineered animals fakes. Only the pigeons scattered by Roy's pursuit of Deckard at the end of the film are authentic. Roy delivers his soliloquy as he sits holding a pigeon in his hands so different from Tyrell's well-engineered observing owl. When Roy dies, his hands relax, the pigeon is released, and... Roy's soul is liberated. guild.com/august_2002/donaldwilliams/literary_magazine.html

Rachel "It's too bad she won't live. But then again, who does?" mages/filmstills/blade1a.jpg

Adam and Eve?

Motifs: The eyes → “I” (Identity) Photographs → a narrative of “self” Memories

od/Boulevard/7920/ojo.jpg Roy to Chew, “if only you could see what I've seen with your eyes.”

a Voigt-Kompt test which checks their irises to see if they have emotional reflexes

White Noise Don DeLillo

The Most Photographed Barn in America: The Most Photographed Barn in America: Knowledge/epistemology: 22-25, , Knowledge/epistemology: 22-25, , Consumerism: 7, 20, 36-38, 82-84, , Consumerism: 7, 20, 36-38, 82-84, , Elvis vs. Hitler: Elvis vs. Hitler: TV: 16, 50-51, 64-66, 92, , , TV: 16, 50-51, 64-66, 92, , ,

SIMUVAC simulation: , 204-7, Tabloid: 5, , 160, 326 Fire (insane asylum): Orest Mercator: , 207-8, , Déjà vu: 116, , 133, 151, , 176, 221 Dylar: 52-53, 123, , , 211 Identity as copy/simulacrum: 16-17, 82-84,

Car crash: 40, Gun: , 274 Consumer trash: Willie Mink: Sister Hermann Marie: Wilder: Cloud/Sunset: , , 170, 227, Death: 6, 15, 26, 37-38, 47, 72-74, 97-98, , , 198, , ,

Other motifs: The American home Murray Jay Siskind Barbette Children Hitler Study White Noise

Coda

“The golden age of cultural theory is long past.” (1) “The golden age of cultural theory is long past.” (1) “For the moment... We are still trading on the past – and this in a world which has changed dramatically since Foucault and Lacan first settled to their typewriters. What kind of fresh thinking does the new era demand?” (2) “For the moment... We are still trading on the past – and this in a world which has changed dramatically since Foucault and Lacan first settled to their typewriters. What kind of fresh thinking does the new era demand?” (2) (After Theory, Terry Eagleton) (After Theory, Terry Eagleton)

The End