Bladerunner

[SG Xibalba]

What did you think the origami unicorn at the end means?

I've never seen the movie, but from each of your inputs about it, this seems pretty obvious. The paper unicorn imitates life in shape, but it's not truly living. Is it anything less beautiful though? Should we think less of it because it's not flesh and blood?

Probably the best post on this thread so far, kudos!

To me, the story and the film is about 2 things: our humanity and our mortality and how we face them. I fell in love with the reimagining of Battlestar Galactica too for the very same reasons - hell, even Edward James Olmos (who also played Gaff in BR) has commented on the parallels between the two.

It's one of my top 5 favorite films of all time, and it still looks stunning today - no small feat for a film made that long ago. I'd recommend 'A Scanner Darkly' as another PKD adaptation that works and makes you think - everything else I've seen has been a bit of a mess or just not stood up to the test of time.

 

[S.H.A.R.P.]

I didn't watch the movie to be honest. I did play the game, which was quite awesome yet pretty difficult. The atmosphere was wonderfully done, though it's been a while since I played the game.

Any of you who played the game thinks I might enjoy watching the movie too?

 

[captainfuzzy]

Deckard is totally a replicant. Ridley Scott said so himself. What did you think the origami unicorn at the end means?

I've never liked the idea of Deckard being a Replicant. The entire point of the movie, or the point that I took away from it, spins on one dichotomy. The Replicants are supposed to be emotionally inferior to humans, and yet Roy and his band of rebellious Replicants are in fact more compassionate (and from a certain point of view, decent) than Deckard, the Blade Runners and the system that they live in, which essentially sanctions murder of thinking beings under the euphemism 'retirement'.

If Deckard is a Replicant, then that kind of messes that up.

Again, you haven't answered how the origami unicorn could fit into your reading of the film.

As for the entire point of the movie, I always thought it was that the dichotomy you mention is false precisely because there is no difference between a human and a replicant. The only way to tell is if you knew beforehand. The fact the replicants behave differently speaks more to their emotional youth than to their artificiality. This movie is all about what it means to be human, and how humans create social divisions based on who is superior. The film is a commentary on all forms of slavery, segregation, caste divisions, and all other such divisions legitimized on characteristics that don't actually matter: skin color, birth right, and in this case, created in a lab or not.

Personally, I feel that if Deckard wasn't a replicant, the movie wouldn't make any sense, nor would it stand out from more generic humans-and-aliens sci-fi flicks that deal with a more traditional approach to the concept of The Other.