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Introduction
Much has already been written about Ridley Scott's Blade Runner (1982; 'The Director's Cut', 1992). So why another paper about a movie which has been discussed and analyzed like only a few others in the past 17 years? Being a product of the early Reagan-era, Blade Runner is inseparably linked not only to the prevalent world wide economic recession but also to the political circumstances of these times. It has also been labelled a 'postmodern classic' and even a 'canonical postmodern cultural artefact' (Clarke, Doel 141). Can postmodern ideas help to analyze the link between the apocalyptic vision of Los Angeles in the year 2019 as depicted in Blade Runner and the United States of the early eighties? I will try to show some of the movie's connections to Reaganism as well as to the social and economic conditions of this period by using ideas about the postmodern self and the postmodern age in general. How is late capitalism linked to questions of existence (Roy and his fellow replicants) and identity (Deckard and Rachel)? Is Blade Runner a comment on Reagan's policies or on the situation at the end of the 20th century in general? I hope that my approach will add at least some new aspects to the interesting and often controversial debate about Scott's movie.
Central topics
The postmodern age is a visual, cinematic age. Representations of the real, whether in the form of film or photography, dominate our perception and have turned many societies, including the American, into visual cultures (Denzin VII-VIII). So the central motif of the eye in Blade Runner provides us with a constant reminder of how important questions of perception and representation of the real are for our interpretation of the film's content and characters. The opening sequence already reflects the cityscape of Los Angeles in the mirror of a rigid eye. Only moments later, the centrally important Voight-Kampff -Test is introduced. Leon, a conventional Nexus 6 replicant, is facing an employee of the Tyrell corporation and a strange aparatus. This machine records the variation of "capillary dilations in the facial area and fluctuations of tension within the eye muscle" in order to determine if the tested subject is a replicant. Hypothetical questions are used to provoke involuntary emotional responses. By cross-referencing the resulting data, the operator is supposed to determine whether or not the tested subject is a replicant. With Leon, the Voight-Kampff-Test is working. He even shortens the procedure by shooting the Tyrell-employee, thereby confirming that he really is what he was suspected to be. With some of the other replicants appearing in the film, the situation is more complicated. Some of them have acquired enhanced emphatic capabilities or were implanted memories as in Rachel's case. Being closer to the 'real thing' than the conventional models, even the empathy test seems almost inappropriate to identify them as products of the Tyrell corporation. The border between humans and replicants dissolves, raising the central question of identity.
The test itself is highly problematic. It is important to note that it cannot confirm a tested subject as human. With such lack of positive confirmation, how can anyone be sure not to be a replicant him- or herself? This is the red thread that guides the viewer through Deckard's contemplations while he is hunting rebelling replicants in the streets of Los Angeles.
What are the characteristics of the environment Deckard has to put up with? Scott's nightmare vision leaves not much room for Los Angeles as we know it. Sunshine has been replaced by rain, light has been exchanged for constant darkness. Science fiction meets film-noir in this city of noise and danger. With his picture of the population, Scott obviously alludes to the fear of many Americans of Asians taking over not only Los Angeles but also the rest of the west. Bicycle-riding, .. unst, 1977-1995. Ed. Werner Faulstich and
Helmut Korte. Frankfurt: Fischer, 1995.
Doel, Marcus A. and David B. Clarke. "From Ramble City to the Screening of the Eye: Blade
Runner, death and symbolic exchange". The Cinematic City. Ed. David B. Clarke. London: Routledge, 1997.
Prince, Stephen. Visions of Empire: Political Imagery in Contemporary American Film. New
York: Praeger, 1992.
Wood, Robin. Hollywood from Vietnam to Reagan. New York: Columbia UP, 1986.
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