Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
Pretty cool. I can imagine this screening was a dream come true for fans of this film, and I still remember bitterly arguing with friends in the summer of ’82, telling them that CONAN and BLADE RUNNER and Carpenter’s THE THING would all be classics in the years to come, defending these films passionately. Now, to see that be true, it’s a constant delight, and I would imagine it must be a rush for guys like Rutger Hauer and Joe Turkel to soak up a bit of the love that exists for the film out there.
Hi Harry,
Omac reporting here from NYC where Saturday night I attended what was billed as a 20th anniversary screening of Blade Runner, this in conjunction with a sci-fi/ comics show that was taking place at Madison Square Garden over the weekend. The film was shown at the Clearview Cinema on East 59st and was attended by both Rutger Hauer and Joe Turkel, who appeared both before and after the screening.
Turkel was fit and limber, he boasted that he was 75 and he really looked as if he could be 10-15 years younger. The guy joined the army, in his mid-teens, to fight for us in WW2, and Saturday night appeared as if he was ready to do it again. Hauer looked heavier but relatively fit. He rambled a bit but never seemed less than honest and charming.
After the show both actors engaged in a spirited, detailed, tag team Q & A. Here are some highlights:
Harrison Ford on the set: Both actors noted that they found the superstar a totally professional, intense, self-absorbed and brooding sort. Turkel noted: “He always looked me in the eyes”. Hauer commented that he thought the Ford performance brought a great “heaviness” to the tone of the film and he seemed to indicate he felt this the appropriate approach.
Hauer said that he viewed Blade Runner as the pinnacle of his career but then sort of noted “We are here to talk about Blade Runner, so what else do you think I would say?” Whatever the case, Hauer seems to have deep affections and strong feelings about the film and the Replicant, Roy Batty. He gave his overall take on the film’s storyline as “a bumbling detective decides he wants to get blowjobs from a fuckdoll”.
Hauer talked at length about Batty’s death scene on the roof. He said that Batty’s death speech was originally written to be more than a full page of dialogue but that he thought most of it sucked and talked Ridley Scott into letting him cut it down. He kind of hinted that he had created some of the lines that were still there -- which he seems to dearly love. He also mentioned that he had suggested the dove, which was supposed to have come from Sebastian’s apartmet. Hauer talked about how they could never get the dove to take off when it was released (he did a hilarious improve of the dove stepping from his hand, walking down his leg and dropping to the ground) so they ended up shooting the insert of it taking off over the roof -- just so we would know it flew away to where it’s still flying around in some John Woo flick :)
Hauer seemed said he always worried if the final shot of the dove was just a bit to much. Also, he feels that the films final scene (Deckard leaving with the girl) is “too Hollywood,” but he didn’t elaborate on what he would have preferred instead. He seemed to feel that this was the movie’s one great flaw.
Hauer said he understood the incredible effect BR had cast over every futuristic movie made since and he noted that he almost felt sorry for the creatives “who had to struggle to do something different. Blade Runner has had its time at the head of the film psyche, and now, I think, just in the last few years, it’s finally dying away”.
Turkel talked about giving advice to an aspiring filmmaker who had recently completed his first film, then revealed that the fellow was in the audience and he was only 7 years old (the kid got some cheers). He noted that when he had worked with Wise, Scott and Kubrick (X3) he had always noted a common, relentless perfectionist instinct for detail. He quoted Kubrick as saying, “Always keep your camera or your actors moving”. Turkel said he loved Kubrick (with whom he worked over 30 years) but was deeply disappointed with EYES WIDE SHUT. He referred to Kubrick’s last film as seeming to him “like an old prize fighter who answers the bell one time too often.” He pointed out how some of the blocking in EYE WIDE SHURT was repetitious of scenes from PATHS OF GLORY: “Stanley was just repeating himself”.
Hauer chimed in here: “Hey, hey, lets show some mercy for the old prize fighters... there’s glory in just answering the bell”. Turkel said he found Ridley Scott to be (predictably) reverential of Kubrick to the point where (during the filming of BR) he would ask Turkel how he thought Stanley would do this or that. Turkel said that Scott had seen Kubrick at parties but had been hesitant to ever approach him. Turkel told Scott: “Next time you see him, just walk up and say ‘Joe says hello’”.
Turkel talked about a missing BR scene (unfilmed?) where, after Batty kills Tyrell, the dead Tyrell would be revealed as a robot, the real Tyrell would be seen in suspended animation at the top of the building/temple. Someone then asked if there was ever talk of a sequel and Turkel said, with a wink and a smile, that “of course it would have to be all about the real Tyrell”.
Toward the end Turkel went back to discussing the great directors he’d worked with and the perfectionist ethic: “This is what all the great ones have”. As an illustration of this he recounted an incident on the set of The Shining where Kubrick had halted shooting when Stan realized an ashtray on the bar was not vintage. Hauer, a recent veteran of many quickly shot B flicks, took a bit of an exception to his friends remarks and added: “Young directors must have the vision, but you must also keep it moving! Don’t think for a second that there isn’t someone standing ten feet away eager to replace you. Don’t overstep your bounds in some obsession to be number one! Brilliance is unique to individuals and shows itself with time. If you’ve got power, use it... don’t abuse it”.
It was a small crowd and by evening's end things had become so pleasant that Turkel stood in the aisle and personally said goodbye to everyone as we left.
-OMAC
Kick-ass, OMAC. Can’t wait for the special edition DVD that Warner Bros. is currently working on with the four different cuts of the movie. Should be exhaustive, and the perfect companion to Paul Sammon’s wonderful FUTURE NOIR, the book that details the development of the film.
"Moriarty" out.
