spb/wp30_uqo

1{2  "document_id": "lb_hotpotqa_98bf7e9946e86278d6d2b938d751861981c5fe14c356ea68",3  "family": "public_hotpotqa",4  "split": "test",5  "text": "Passage 1:\nThe Lives of a Bengal Lancer (film)\nThe Lives of a Bengal Lancer is a 1935 American adventure film starring Gary Cooper, directed by Henry Hathaway, and written by Grover Jones, William Slavens McNutt, Waldemar Young, John L. Balderston, and Achmed Abdullah. The setting and title come from the 1930 autobiography of the British soldier Francis Yeats-Brown.\nThe story, which has little in common with Yeats-Brown’s book, tells of a group of British cavalrymen and high-ranking officers desperately trying to defend their stronghold and headquarters at Bengal against the rebellious natives during the days of the British Raj. Cooper plays Lieutenant Alan McGregor, Franchot Tone, Lieutenant John Forsythe, Richard Cromwell, Lieutenant Donald Stone, Guy Standing, Colonel Tom Stone, and Douglass Dumbrille plays the rebel leader Mohammed Khan, who reads the now often-misquoted line \"We have ways to make men talk.\"The film was produced by released by Paramount Pictures. Planning began in 1931, and Paramount had expected the film to be released that same year. However, most of the location footage deteriorated due to the high temperatures, and the project was delayed. It was eventually released in the US in 1935.\nIt met with positive reviews and good box office results, and was nominated for seven Academy Awards, winning Assistant Director, with other nominations including Best Original Screenplay and Best Picture. The film grossed $1.5 million in worldwide theatrical rentals.\n\nPlot\nOn the northwest frontier of India during the British Raj, Scottish Canadian  Lieutenant Alan McGregor  (Gary Cooper), in charge of newcomers, welcomes two replacements to the 41st Bengal Lancers: Lieutenant John Forsythe  (Franchot Tone) and  Lieutenant Donald Stone  (Richard Cromwell), the son of the unit's commander, Colonel Tom Stone  (Guy Standing). Lieutenant Stone, a \"cub\" (meaning a newly commissioned officer), eagerly anticipated serving on the Indian frontier, particularly because he specifically was requested and assumed that his father sent for him; Lieutenant Forsythe, an experienced cavalrymen and something of a teasing character, was sent out as a replacement for an officer who was killed in action. \nAfter his arrival Lieutenant Stone discovers that his father keeps him at arms length, wanting to treat him the same as he treats all of the other men. He also reveals that he did not request his son serve in his regiment, a discovery that breaks his heart and leads to him going on a drunken bender. Attempting to show impartiality, the colonel treats his son indifferently. The Colonel's commitment to strictly military behavior and adherence to protocol is interpreted by young Stone as rejection. He had not seen his father since he was a boy and had looked forward to spending time with him.\nLieutenant Barrett (Colin Tapley), disguised as a native rebel in order to spy on Mohammed Khan (Douglass Dumbrille), reports that Khan is preparing an uprising against the British. He plans to intercept and hijack a military convoy transporting two million rounds of ammunition. When Khan discovers that Colonel Stone knows of his plan, he orders Tania Volkanskaya, a beautiful Russian agent, to seduce and kidnap Lieutenant Stone in an attempt to extract classified information about the ammunition caravan from him, or use him as leverage to attract his father. When the colonel refuses to attempt his son's rescue, McGregor and Forsythe, appalled by the seeming lack of concern the colonel has for his own son, leave the camp at night without orders. Disguised as native merchants trying to sell blankets, they successfully get inside Khan's fortress. However, they are recognized by Tania, who had met the two men at a social event. McGregor and Forsythe are taken prisoner.\nDuring interrogation, Khan wants to know when and where the munitions will be transported so that he can attack and steal the arms. He has the prisoners tortured for the information. Bamboo shoots are shoved under their fingernails and set on fire. McGregor and Forsythe refuse to talk, but the demoralized Stone, feeling rejected by his father, cracks and reveals what he knows. As a result, the ammunition convoy is captured.\nAfter receiving news of the stolen ammunition, Colonel Stone takes the 41st to battle Khan. From their cell, the captives see the overmatched Bengal Lancers deploy to assault Khan's fortress. They manage to escape and blow up the ammunition tower, McGregor manning a machine gun and dying in the assault. Young Stone redeems himself by killing Khan with a dagger. With their ammunition gone, their leader dead, and their fortress in ruins, the remaining rebels surrender.\nIn recognition of their bravery and valor in battle, Lieutenants Forsythe and Stone are awarded the Distinguished Service Order. McGregor posthumously receives the Victoria Cross, Great Britain's highest award for military valor, with Colonel Stone pinning the medal to the saddle cloth of McGregor's horse in the custom in the 41st Lancers.\n\nCast\nGary Cooper as  Lieutenant Alan McGregor, a highly experienced officer in his mid-thirties, who has spent a long time with the regiment. McGregor, a Canadian, is portrayed as a charming, open character who befriends most officers, but because of disregard for his superiors and habit of speaking his mind is regarded askance by his superiors, who nevertheless respect his military abilities.\nFranchot Tone as  Lieutenant John Forsythe, an upper-class cavalryman in his mid-twenties from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. Transferred from the Blues, one of the two regiments at the time the movie was made tasked with guarding the Sovereign, Forsythe is presented as the  funny guy  of the main characters, and is noteworthy for his Sandhurst style in military exercise, something that earns him countless compliments from his superiors.Richard Cromwell as  Lieutenant Donald Stone, a recent graduate of Sandhurst and a very young officer. As the son of a colonel with a famous name, he is treated respectfully but becomes frustrated and morose because of personal issues with his father.\nGuy Standing  as  Colonel Tom Stone, a long-serving colonel who left his home in Britain to serve on the Frontier, and explains to his son in the film that the \"service always comes first ... something your mother never understood.\" He is considered to be a dyed-in-the-wool, by-the-book colonel who suppresses his feelings and never does anything without orders.\nC. Aubrey Smith as  Major Hamilton, an old, very experienced major who serves as Colonel Stone's adjutant and Lieutenant Stone's second father and friend. He, along with his chief, planned and coordinated the big assault on Mohammad Khan's fortress.\nKathleen Burke as  Tania Volkanskaya, a beautiful and seductive young Russian woman who is Khan's ally. She is used as Khan's secret ace, who seduces young men when needed to forward Khan's plans. It was she who, with considerable ease, outwitted first Stone and then McGregor and Forsythe.\nDouglass Dumbrille as  Mohammed Khan, a well-known, wealthy prince of the region, educated at Oxford and ostensibly a friend of the British. He is also the secret rebel leader who fights for Bengal's independence from the British Crown. He is portrayed as the film's villain and is responsible for the death and torture of many people.\nColin Tapley as  Lieutenant Barrett, a close friend of Lieutenant McGregor who has been ordered to infiltrate Khan's group of bandits and delivers vital information about the rebels' location and movement.\nLumsden Hare as  Major General Woodley, the man in  command of the British intelligence service in India. He is disliked by most of the regiment's officers, especially McGregor, because his orders usually involve training exercises in locations where the pig-sticking is good. He thought of and approved the attack on Khan's stronghold.\nJ. Carrol Naish as Grand Vizier\nJames Dime\n\nProduction\nStock crisis\nParamount originally planned to produce the film in 1931 and sent cinematographers Ernest B. Schoedsack and Rex Wimpy to India to film location shots such as a tiger hunt. However, much of the film stock deteriorated in the hot sun while on location, so when the film was eventually made, much of the production took place in the hills surrounding Los Angeles, where Northern Paiute people were used as extras.According to Hathaway, Schoedack struggled with the studio so was replaced by Steven Roberts, who began spending more money than Paramount were willing to, so he was fired. Gary Cooper had director approval and he suggested Henry Hathaway, whose Westerns the actor admired - it was Hathaway's entry into big budget films. The director had been to India for nine months and remembered everything being white so insisted on that in the film.\n\nFilming\nAmong the filming locations were Lone Pine, Calif., Buffalo Flats in Malibu, Calif., the Paramount Ranch in Agoura, Calif., and the Iverson Movie Ranch in Chatsworth, Calif. For the climactic half-hour battle sequence at the end of the film, an elaborate set was built in the Iverson Gorge, part of the Iverson Movie Ranch, to depict Mogala, the mountain stronghold of Mohammed Khan.\n\nRelease\nBox office\nThe film was released in American cinemas in January 1935. It was a big success at the box office and kicked off a cycle of Imperial adventure tales, including The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), Another Dawn (1937), Gunga Din (1939), The Four Feathers (1939), and The Real Glory (1939). The film had theatrical rentals of about $1 million in the U.S. and Canada, and $1.5 million worldwide. It was the second most popular film at the British box office in 1935–36. The film was successful enough that it led to Gary Cooper being booked to star in a number of films of similar plots that were also set in \"exotic\" locales, including Beau Geste, The Real Glory, North West Mounted Police and Distant Drums.\n\nCritical reception and influence\nLaura Elston from the magazine Canada wrote that The Lives of a Bengal Lancer did \"more glory to the British traditions than the British would dare to do for themselves.\" In response to the film success, Frederick Herron of the Motion Picture Association of America wrote \"Hollywood is doing a very good work in selling the British Empire to the world.\"Writer John Howard Reid noted in his book Award-Winning Films of the 1930s that the film is considered \"one of the greatest adventure films of all time\" and highly praised Hathaway's work by saying \"the film really made his reputation.\" It also received a praised review in Boys' Life magazine, starting off the review with the words \"You will be immensely pleased with The Lives of a Bengal lancer\" and went on to compare the style and class of the three main characters to that of The Three Musketeers. The film holds an overall approval rating of 100% on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 9 reviews, with a rating average of 8 out of 10.Critic Otis Ferguson said he was \"taken by the show, imperialism and all.\" Andre Sennwald of The New York Times said the film \"glorified the British Empire better than any film produced in Britain for that purpose.\"  Sennwald added that Paramount's \"Kiplingesque\" movie \"ought to prove a blessing to Downing Street.\" The film proved so popular in the United States that it spurred a series of imperial films that continued throughout the decade and into the next decade. Frank S. Nugent, also of The New York Times, wrote that \"England need have no fears for its empire so long as Hollywood insists upon being the Kipling of the Pacific.\" Nugent commented that movies such as The Lives of a Bengal Lancer and The Charge of the Light Brigade were far more pro-British than actual British filmmakers would ever dare to be: \"In its veneration of British colonial policy, in its respect for the omniscience and high moral purpose of His, or Her, Majesty's diplomatic representatives and in its adulation of the courage, the virtue and the manly beauty of English soldiery abroad, Hollywood yields to no one—not even to the British filmmakers themselves.\"In Fascist Italy, Mussolini's motion picture bureau had the movie banned, as well as several other British-themed American movies, including Lloyd's of London and The Charge of the Light Brigade, on the grounds that they were \"propaganda\".\nAccording to Ivone Kirkpatrick, who met Adolf Hitler at Berchtesgaden in 1937, one of Hitler's favorite films was The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, which he had watched three times. He liked the film because \"it depicted a handful of Britons holding a continent in thrall. That was how a superior race must behave and the film was a compulsory viewing for the S.S.\"\nAlso, his valet recalled that Hitler enjoyed the film.\nIt was one of the eleven US movies that, from 1933 to 1937, were considered \"artistically valuable\" by the Nazi authorities.\n\nPlot discrepancies\nThe film shares nothing with the source book, except the setting. Reid noted in Award-Winning Films of the 1930s that \"none of the characters in the book appear in the screenplay, not even Yeats-Brown himself. The plot of the film is also entirely different.\"\n\nHome media\nThe Paramount picture was distributed to home media on VHS on March 1, 1992 and on DVD on May 31, 2005. It has since been released in multiple languages and is included in several multi-film collections.\n\nAwards\nThe film was nominated for the following Academy Awards, winning in one category:\n\nSee also\nThe Witching Hour\nThe Shepherd of the Hills\nNow and Forever\nPassage 2:\nThe White Haired Witch of Lunar Kingdom\nThe White Haired Witch of Lunar Kingdom is a 2014 Chinese wuxia-fantasy film based on the best-selected novel Romance of the White-Haired Maiden written by Liang Yusheng. Directed by Jacob Cheung and co-produced by Bona Film Group and Huang Jianxin with the creative consultant led by Tsui Hark, the film stars Fan Bingbing, Huang Xiaoming, Vincent Zhao and others among the supporting cast. Originally scheduled for release on 25 April 2014, the film was moved to 1 August 2014, then moved a day earlier to 31 July 2014.\n\nCast\nFan Bingbing as Lian Nishang\nHuang Xiaoming as Zhuo Yihang\nVincent Zhao as Jin Duyi\nWang Xuebing as Murong Chong\nNi Dahong as Wei Zhongxian\nTong Yao as Ke Pingting\nLi Xinru as Tie Shanhu\nCecilia Yip as Ling Yunfeng\nYan Yikuan as Huangtaiji\n\nProduction\nThe White Haired Witch of Lunar Kingdom was produced at a budget of 100 million yuan. Shooting started in November 2012 and ended in March 2013. During filming, Huang Xiaoming had a three-metre fall after a wire accident on the set and he fractured two toes on his left foot. He had to sit in a wheelchair for weeks, but resumed filming even though he had yet to fully recover. On 2 April 2013, Huang and Fan Bingbing attended a press conference in Beijing to talk about their experiences in filming White Haired Witch.\n\nReception\nBox office\nThe film grossed US$61,900,000 in mainland China and a total of US$64.2 million internationally.\n\nCritical response\nThe film received negative reviews from audiences. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports a 0 approval rating from critics, with an average score of 4.3/10, based on 6 reviews. The Hollywood Reporter said, \"it's a shame that Cheung's first film in seven years is eventually weighed down by this rushed, uneven sprawl of a story credited to five screenwriters, each of whom possibly bringing their own references (ranging from political-parable historical dramas like last year's Life of Ming, to the contemporary dramas like Infernal Affairs) and their perspective in how to make The White Haired Witch connect with a new generation of viewers. Their attempt in reinventing this tale sits uncomfortably with the one central element that couldn't be moved — that is, the troubled (and sloppily presented) romance involving the title character.\"On Chinese movie review site Douban, the film has a rating of 3.8/10, based on 51590 viewers. On Mtime.com, it has a score of 5.5 out of 10, based on 13137 viewers.\nPassage 3:\nMorgan Paull\nMorgan Paull (December 15, 1944 – July 17, 2012) was an American actor most notable for playing Dave Holden in the Ridley Scott film Blade Runner.\n\nEarly life\nMorgan Paull was born to a wealthy family in Wheeling, West Virginia and appeared in many high school plays. When he told his father that he wanted to attend Boston University to continue acting, his father disagreed with his plans and Morgan ran off. He went to the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia and then later appeared on Broadway in New Faces of 1965 and the off-Broadway show That Thing at the Cherry Lane.\n\nCareer\nAfter moving to LA, he appeared in Muzeeka at the Mark Taper Forum and caught the attention of director Franklin Schaffner and producer Frank McCarthy. He made his acting debut in the 1970 film Patton playing Captain Richard N. Jenson. He was in the 1971 film Fools' Parade with Jimmy Stewart and the 1976 film The Last Hard Men with Charlton Heston. He is also known for playing the scheming Philip Wendell in the 1978 American television miniseries Centennial and a greedy businessman in the 1984 comedy Surf II.\n\nPersonal life\nUntil his death he resided in Lake Arrowhead in the mountains northeast of Los Angeles in the San Bernardino National Forest about 90 miles (140 km) from Hollywood. Paull was married four times, first to Gaye Huston in 1965 until they divorced in 1976. He was then married to Carmen Paull from 1976 to 1996, which ended in divorce. He was then married to April Paull in 1990 until that marriage ended in divorce. He later married Jenny Elam in 2004 until his death in 2012. Paull had two daughters.Paull died on July 17, 2012 from stomach cancer in his home in Ashland, Oregon. He is buried in the Paull family plot, located in section 10 of Greenwood Cemetery, Wheeling, Ohio County, West Virginia.\n\nFilmography\nFilm\nTelevision\nPassage 4:\nDirty O'Neil\nDirty O'Neil is a 1974 American film directed by Leon Capetanos and Lewis Teague.\n\nPlot\nJimmy O'Neil (Morgan Paull), a cop in a small California town with a fondness for women, is forced into action when a trio of homicidal thugs invade the town.\n\nCast\nMorgan Paull - Jimmy O'Neill\nArt Metrano - Lassiter\nPat Anderson - Lizzie\nJeane Manson - Ruby\nKatie Saylor - Vera\nRaymond O'Keefe - Lou\nTommy J. Huff  - Bennie\nBob Potter - Al\nSam Laws - Clyde\nLiv Lindeland - Mrs. Crawford\nKitty Carl - Bobby\nTara Strohmeier - Mary\nSusan McIver - Helen\n\nSee also\nList of American films of 1974\nPassage 5:\nThe Man in the Iron Mask (1977 film)\nThe Man in the Iron Mask is a 1977 television film loosely adapted from the 1847–1850 novel The Vicomte de Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas and presenting several plot similarities with the 1939 film version. It was produced by Norman Rosemont for ITC Entertainment, and starred Richard Chamberlain as King Louis XIV and his twin Philippe, Patrick McGoohan as Nicolas Fouquet, Ralph Richardson as Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis Jourdan as D'Artagnan, and Ian Holm as the Chevalier Duval.  Jenny Agutter plays Louis XIV's mistress, Louise de la Vallière. Vivien Merchant appears as Queen Marie-Therese.  It was directed by Mike Newell.\n\nPlot\nIn this version, the twins' ages are swapped. Philippe is the firstborn and rightful king, who had been spirited away at birth and raised with no knowledge of his true identity in a plot by Cardinal Mazarin to manipulate Louis before his own death. Colbert and D'Artagnan plot to replace Louis (who is an ineffective king more interested in dancing and pleasure than the welfare of France) with Philippe, and in the process bring down the corrupt finance minister Fouquet, who has embezzled from the national treasury. Louis is repulsed by his own wife and makes repeated advances on Louise, who is in turn repulsed by him yet falls in love with Philippe.\n\nCast\nRichard Chamberlain as King Louis XIV/Philippe\nJenny Agutter as Louise de La Vallière, Louis XIV's mistress\nPatrick McGoohan as Nicolas Fouquet\nRalph Richardson as Jean-Baptiste Colbert\nLouis Jourdan as D'Artagnan\nIan Holm as the Chevalier Duval\nHugh Fraser as Montfleury\nBrenda Bruce as Queen Anne of Austria\nVivien Merchant as Queen Marie-Therese\n\nProduction\nFilming\nAlthough a made-for-TV movie, actual locations in France were used for filming, including the Château de Fontainebleau and Fouquet's actual chateau of Vaux-le-Vicomte for the final ball scene.\n\nExternal links\nThe Man in the Iron Mask at IMDb\nThe Man in the Iron Mask at AllMovie\nPassage 6:\nHarrison Bergeron (film)\nHarrison Bergeron is a 1995 cable science fiction television movie film loosely adapted from Kurt Vonnegut's 1961 dystopian  short story of the same name. It was produced for Showtime and first screened on August 13, 1995. It was released to VHS in 1998.\n\nPlot\nHarrison Bergeron lives in the fictional suburban town of Madison, Rhode Island in the year 2053. The audience is told that after the second American Revolution, which started during an ongoing economic depression that was a result of a combination of technological advancement and a widening disparity between the very rich and the very poor, it was mandated that all people be equal in all things. To this end, the social norm of this society has become dystopian egalitarianism. Citizens are pushed to strive to be of equal wealth, intelligence, athletic prowess and social status to all around them. Through a process of selective breeding, mankind is perfecting the perfectly average human being. What is not accomplished through arranged marriages is made up for through technological means, the most prominent of which are showing only mind numbing TV shows, and a headband device worn by all citizens which modulates intelligence, dialing a person's IQ up or down in order to arrive at a 'perfect' 100.\nThere are limits to the success of the devices, however, and Harrison Bergeron is one such case. He is a total failure in school, consistently receiving A's (C is the desired grade). Even though he has been held back four years and his headband is consistently modified to dampen his intelligence, he still continues to excel to the embarrassment of him and his family.\nHarrison goes to see a doctor about his intelligence problem, and after several tests it is determined that the headband is unsuccessful because Harrison's synaptic connections reroute themselves after each adjustment in order to overcome the inhibitions the headband is designed to place on the thought process. He is told that he will have to have an operation akin to a lobotomy in order to permanently lower his intelligence.\nIn his last day with a fully functioning brain, he goes to a \"head house\", where, in a parody of a bordello, men make plans to make high-end educational conversation with exceptionally smart women. Illegal device-free women are paid to play chess and conduct intelligent conversations with the clients. His first intelligent conversation ever with \"mind whore\" Phillipa is interrupted by a police bust. While the raid on the police station is underway Phillipa addresses a hidden camera saying not to take him away, and that she likes him. While being held captive in the police station, he is approached by a special agent who offers him an alternative to the lobotomy - to join what turns out to be the secret elite that runs the government.\nHarrison falls in love with Phillipa there, but he illegally impregnates her and she is lobotomized for trying to escape.  He feels he can no longer continue to betray his values and decides to take action. He breaks into a TV studio and reveals the truth about the secret society to the viewers. Eventually, the guards break through, and later on he is forced to make an appearance on TV and pretend the broadcast was not real. Instead, he uses his chance to commit suicide by shooting himself in front of the viewers. The story is framed by an additional perspective from Bergeron's parents, who are watching the incident on TV, but who, because of his father's handicapping due to his superior intelligence and his mother's less than average intelligence, cannot concentrate enough to appreciate what occurs nor remember it.\nIn a final scene, a young boy and his friend get together in his bedroom to watch the first four hours of Bergeron's broadcast, without their bands. Downstairs, one boy's mother looks up the stairs with a look of recognition on her face; she is seen to be Phillipa.\n\nCast\nSean Astin as Harrison Bergeron\nMiranda de Pencier as Phillipa\nEugene Levy as President McCloskey\nMairlyn Smith as Janet Mckloskey\nHowie Mandel as Charlie (of 'Chat with Charlie')\nAndrea Martin as  Diana Moon Glampers\nChristopher Plummer as John Klaxon\nNigel Bennett as Dr. Eisenstock\nPeter Boretski as Newman\nDavid Calderisi as Commissioner Benson\nEmmanuelle Chriqui as Jeannie\nHayden Christensen as Eric\nCindy Cook as Weatherperson\nRoger Dunn as George Bergeron\nJayne Eastwood as Ms. Newbound\nHal Eisen as TV Announcer - San Quentin\nMatthew Ferguson as Garth Bergeron\nMichael Fletcher - Technician\nJohn Friesen as Frank the Plumber\nLinda Goranson as Hazel Bergeron\nRichard Monette as Eric Shockley\nQuyen Hua as Wang\n\nProduction and release\nHarrison Bergeron was filmed in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and the University of Toronto Scarborough campus.\n\nAwards\nHarrison Bergeron was nominated in four categories at the 1996 Gemini Awards for Best Direction, Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role, Best Production Design or Art Direction and Best Sound.\nPassage 7:\nBlade Runner\nBlade Runner is a 1982 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott, and written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples. Starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, and Edward James Olmos, it is an adaptation of Philip K. Dick's 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The film is set in a dystopian future Los Angeles of 2019, in which synthetic humans known as replicants are bio-engineered by the powerful Tyrell Corporation to work on space colonies. When a fugitive group of advanced replicants led by Roy Batty (Hauer) escapes back to Earth, burnt-out cop Rick Deckard (Ford) reluctantly agrees to hunt them down.\nBlade Runner initially underperformed in North American theaters and polarized critics; some praised its thematic complexity and visuals, while others critiqued its slow pacing and lack of action. It later became a cult film, and has since come to be regarded as one of the greatest science fiction films of all time. Hailed for its production design depicting a high-tech but decaying future, Blade Runner is often regarded as both a leading example of neo-noir cinema as well as a foundational work of the cyberpunk genre. The film's soundtrack, composed by Vangelis, was nominated in 1982 for a BAFTA and a Golden Globe as best original score.\nThe film has influenced many science fiction films, video games, anime, and television series. It brought the work of Philip K. Dick to the attention of Hollywood, and several of his works later became films such as Total Recall (1990), Minority Report (2002), and A Scanner Darkly (2006). In 1993, it was selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being \"culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant\".\nSeven different versions of Blade Runner exist as a result of controversial changes requested by studio executives. A director's cut was released in 1992 after a strong response to test screenings of a workprint. This, in conjunction with the film's popularity as a video rental, made it one of the earliest movies to be released on DVD. In 2007, Warner Bros. released The Final Cut, a 25th-anniversary digitally remastered version. This is the only version over which Scott retained artistic control.\nThe film is the first of the franchise of the same name. A sequel, directed by Denis Villeneuve and titled Blade Runner 2049, was released in October 2017 alongside a trilogy of short films covering the thirty-year span between the two films' settings. The anime series Blade Runner: Black Lotus was released in 2021.\n\nPlot\nIn 2019 Los Angeles, former police officer Rick Deckard is detained by Officer Gaff, who likes to make origami figures, and is brought to his former supervisor, Bryant. Deckard, whose job as a \"blade runner\" was to track down bioengineered humanoids known as replicants and terminally \"retire\" them, is informed that four replicants are on Earth illegally. Deckard begins to leave, but Bryant ambiguously threatens him and Deckard stays. The two watch a video of a blade runner named Holden administering the Voight-Kampff test, which is designed to distinguish replicants from humans based on their emotional responses to questions. The test subject, Leon, shoots Holden on the second question. Bryant wants Deckard to retire Leon and three other Nexus-6 replicants: Roy Batty, Zhora, and Pris.\nBryant has Deckard meet with the CEO of the company that creates the replicants, Eldon Tyrell, so he can administer the test on a Nexus-6 to see if it works. Tyrell expresses his interest in seeing the test fail first and asks him to administer it on his assistant Rachael. After a much longer than standard test, Deckard concludes privately to Tyrell that Rachael is a replicant who believes she is human. Tyrell explains that she is an experiment who has been given false memories to provide an \"emotional cushion\", and that she has no knowledge of her true nature.\nIn searching Leon's hotel room, Deckard finds photos and a scale from the skin of an animal, which is later identified as a synthetic snake scale. Roy and Leon investigate a replicant eye-manufacturing laboratory and learn of J. F. Sebastian, a gifted genetic designer who works closely with Tyrell. Deckard returns to his apartment where Rachael is waiting. She tries to prove her humanity by showing him a family photo, but Deckard reveals that her memories are implants from Tyrell's niece, and she leaves in tears. Meanwhile, Pris locates Sebastian and manipulates him to gain his trust.\nA photograph from Leon's apartment and the snake scale lead Deckard to a strip club, where Zhora works. After a confrontation and chase, Deckard kills Zhora. Bryant also orders him to retire Rachael, who has disappeared from the Tyrell Corporation. Deckard spots Rachael in a crowd, but he is ambushed by Leon, who knocks the gun out of Deckard's hand and beats him. As Leon is about to kill Deckard, Rachael saves him by using Deckard's gun to kill Leon. They return to Deckard's apartment and, during a discussion, he promises not to track her down. As Rachael abruptly tries to leave, Deckard restrains her and forces her to kiss him, and she ultimately relents.\nDeckard leaves Rachael at his apartment and departs to search for the remaining replicants. Roy arrives at Sebastian's apartment and tells Pris that the other replicants are dead. Sebastian reveals that because of a genetic premature aging disorder, his life will be cut short, like the replicants that were built with a four-year lifespan. Roy uses Sebastian to gain entrance to Tyrell's penthouse. He demands more life from his maker, which Tyrell says is impossible. Roy confesses that he has done \"questionable things\" but Tyrell dismisses this, praising Roy's advanced design and accomplishments in his short life. Roy kisses Tyrell and then kills him by crushing his skull. Sebastian tries to flee and is later reported dead.At Sebastian's apartment, Deckard is ambushed by Pris, but he kills her as Roy returns. Roy's body begins to fail as the end of his lifespan nears. He chases Deckard through the building and onto the roof. Deckard tries to jump onto another roof but is left hanging on the edge. Roy makes the jump with ease and, as Deckard's grip loosens, Roy hoists him onto the roof to save him. Before Roy dies, he laments that his memories \"will be lost in time, like tears in rain\". Gaff arrives to congratulate Deckard, also reminding him that Rachael will not live, but \"then again, who does?\" Deckard returns to his apartment to retrieve Rachael. While escorting her to the elevator, he notices a small origami unicorn on the floor. He recalls Gaff's words and departs with Rachael.\n\nCast\nProduction\nDevelopment\nInterest in adapting Philip K. Dick's novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? developed shortly after its 1968 publication. Director Martin Scorsese was interested in filming the novel, but never optioned it. Producer Herb Jaffe optioned it in the early 1970s, but Dick was unimpressed with the screenplay written by Herb's son Robert, saying, \"Jaffe's screenplay was so terribly done ... Robert flew down to Santa Ana to speak with me about the project. And the first thing I said to him when he got off the plane was, 'Shall I beat you up here at the airport, or shall I beat you up back at my apartment?'\"The screenplay by Hampton Fancher was optioned in 1977. Producer Michael Deeley became interested in Fancher's draft and convinced director Ridley Scott to film it. Scott had previously declined the project, but after leaving the slow production of Dune, wanted a faster-paced project to take his mind off his older brother's recent death. He joined the project on February 21, 1980, and managed to push up the promised Filmways financing from US$13 million to $15 million. Fancher's script focused more on environmental issues and less on issues of humanity and religion, which are prominent in the novel, and Scott wanted changes. Fancher found a cinema treatment by William S. Burroughs for Alan E. Nourse's novel The Bladerunner (1974), titled Blade Runner (a movie). Scott liked the name, so Deeley obtained the rights to the titles. Eventually, he hired David Peoples to rewrite the script and Fancher left the job over the issue on December 21, 1980, although he later returned to contribute additional rewrites.Having invested over $2.5 million in pre-production, as the date of commencement of principal photography neared, Filmways withdrew financial backing. In ten days Deeley had secured $21.5 million in financing through a three-way deal between the Ladd Company (through Warner Bros.), the Hong Kong-based producer Sir Run Run Shaw and Tandem Productions.Dick became concerned that no one had informed him about the film's production, which added to his distrust of Hollywood. After Dick criticized an early version of Fancher's script in an article written for the Los Angeles Select TV Guide, the studio sent Dick the Peoples rewrite. Although Dick died shortly before the film's release, he was pleased with the rewritten script and with a 20-minute special effects test reel that was screened for him when he was invited to the studio. Despite his well-known skepticism of Hollywood in principle, Dick enthused to Scott that the world created for the film looked exactly as he had imagined it. He said, \"I saw a segment of Douglas Trumbull's special effects for Blade Runner on the KNBC news. I recognized it immediately. It was my own interior world. They caught it perfectly.\" He also approved of the film's script, saying, \"After I finished reading the screenplay, I got the novel out and looked through it. The two reinforce each other so that someone who started with the novel would enjoy the movie and someone who started with the movie would enjoy the novel.\" The motion picture was dedicated to Dick. Principal photography of Blade Runner began on March 9, 1981, and ended four months later.In 1992, Ford revealed, \"Blade Runner is not one of my favorite films. I tangled with Ridley.\" Apart from friction with the director, Ford also disliked the voiceovers: \"When we started shooting it had been tacitly agreed that the version of the film that we had agreed upon was the version without voiceover narration. It was a f**king [sic] nightmare. I thought that the film had worked without the narration. But now I was stuck re-creating that narration. And I was obliged to do the voiceovers for people that did not represent the director's interests.\" \"I went kicking and screaming to the studio to record it.\" The narration monologs were written by an uncredited Roland Kibbee.In 2006, Scott was asked \"Who's the biggest pain in the arse you've ever worked with?\" He replied: \"It's got to be Harrison ... he'll forgive me because now I get on with him. Now he's become charming. But he knows a lot, that's the problem. When we worked together it was my first film up and I was the new kid on the block. But we made a good movie.\" Ford said of Scott in 2000: \"I admire his work. We had a bad patch there, and I'm over it.\" In 2006 Ford reflected on the production of the film saying: \"What I remember more than anything else when I see Blade Runner is not the 50 nights of shooting in the rain, but the voiceover ... I was still obliged to work for these clowns that came in writing one bad voiceover after another.\" Ridley Scott confirmed in the summer 2007 issue of Total Film that Harrison Ford contributed to the Blade Runner Special Edition DVD, and had already recorded his interviews. \"Harrison's fully on board\", said Scott.\nThe Bradbury Building in downtown Los Angeles served as a filming location, and a Warner Bros. backlot housed the 2019 Los Angeles street sets. Other locations included the Ennis-Brown House and the 2nd Street Tunnel. Test screenings resulted in several changes, including adding a voice-over, a happy ending, and the removal of a Holden hospital scene. The relationship between the filmmakers and the investors was difficult, which culminated in Deeley and Scott being fired but still working on the film. Crew members created T-shirts during filming saying, \"Yes Guv'nor, My Ass\" that mocked Scott's unfavorable comparison of U.S. and British crews; Scott responded with a T-shirt of his own, \"Xenophobia Sucks\", making the incident known as the T-shirt war.\n\nCasting\nCasting the film proved troublesome, particularly for the lead role of Deckard. Screenwriter Hampton Fancher envisioned Robert Mitchum as Deckard and wrote the character's dialogue with Mitchum in mind. Director Ridley Scott and the film's producers spent months meeting and discussing the role with Dustin Hoffman, who eventually departed over differences in vision. Harrison Ford was ultimately chosen for several reasons, including his performance in the Star Wars films, Ford's interest in the Blade Runner story, and discussions with Steven Spielberg who was finishing Raiders of the Lost Ark at the time and strongly praised Ford's work in the film. Following his success in those two films, Ford was looking for a role with dramatic depth. According to production documents, several actors were considered for the role, including Gene Hackman, Sean Connery, Jack Nicholson, Paul Newman, Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Peter Falk, Nick Nolte, Al Pacino and Burt Reynolds.One role that was not difficult to cast was Rutger Hauer as Roy Batty, the violent yet thoughtful leader of the replicants. Scott cast Hauer without having met him, based solely on Hauer's performances in Paul Verhoeven's movies Scott had seen (Katie Tippel, Soldier of Orange, and Turkish Delight). Hauer's portrayal of Batty was regarded by Philip K. Dick as \"the perfect Batty – cold, Aryan, flawless\". Of the many films Hauer made, Blade Runner was his favorite. As he explained in a live chat in 2001, \"Blade Runner needs no explanation. It just [is]. All of the best. There is nothing like it. To be part of a real masterpiece which changed the world's thinking. It's awesome.\" Hauer rewrote his character's \"tears in rain\" speech himself and presented the words to Scott on set prior to filming.\nBlade Runner used a number of then-lesser-known actors: Sean Young portrays Rachael, an experimental replicant implanted with the memories of Tyrell's niece, causing her to believe she is human; Nina Axelrod auditioned for the role. Daryl Hannah portrays Pris, a \"basic pleasure model\" replicant; Stacey Nelkin auditioned for the role, but was given another part in the film, which was ultimately cut before filming. Debbie Harry turned down the role of Pris. Casting Pris and Rachael was challenging, requiring several screen tests with Morgan Paull playing the role of Deckard. Paull was cast as Deckard's fellow bounty hunter Holden based on his performances in the tests. Brion James portrays Leon Kowalski, a combat and laborer replicant, and Joanna Cassidy portrays Zhora, an assassin replicant.\nEdward James Olmos portrays Gaff. Olmos drew on diverse ethnic sources to help create the fictional \"Cityspeak\" language his character uses in the film. His initial address to Deckard at the noodle bar is partly in Hungarian and means, \"Horse dick [bullshit]! No way. You are the Blade ... Blade Runner.\" M. Emmet Walsh portrays Captain Bryant, a rumpled, hard-drinking and underhanded police veteran typical of the film noir genre. Joe Turkel portrays Dr. Eldon Tyrell, a corporate mogul who built an empire on genetically manipulated humanoid slaves. William Sanderson was cast as J. F. Sebastian, a quiet and lonely genius who provides a compassionate yet compliant portrait of humanity. J. F. sympathizes with the replicants, whom he sees as companions, and he shares their shorter lifespan due to his rapid aging disease. Joe Pantoliano had earlier been considered for the role. James Hong portrays Hannibal Chew, an elderly geneticist specializing in synthetic eyes, and Hy Pyke portrayed the sleazy bar owner Taffey Lewis – in a single take, something almost unheard-of with Scott, whose drive for perfection resulted at times in double-digit takes.\n\nDesign\nScott credits Edward Hopper's painting Nighthawks and the French science fiction comics magazine Métal Hurlant, to which the artist Jean \"Moebius\" Giraud contributed, as stylistic mood sources. He also drew on the landscape of \"Hong Kong on a very bad day\" and the industrial landscape of his one-time home in northeast England. The visual style of the movie is influenced by the work of futurist Italian architect Antonio Sant'Elia. Scott hired Syd Mead as his concept artist; like Scott, he was influenced by Métal Hurlant. Moebius was offered the opportunity to assist in the pre-production of Blade Runner, but he declined so that he could work on René Laloux's animated film Les Maîtres du temps – a decision that he later regretted. Production designer Lawrence G. Paull and art director David Snyder realized Scott's and Mead's sketches. Douglas Trumbull and Richard Yuricich supervised the special effects for the film, and Mark Stetson served as chief model maker.Blade Runner has numerous similarities to Fritz Lang's Metropolis, including a built-up urban environment, in which the wealthy literally live above the workers, dominated by a huge building – the Stadtkrone Tower in Metropolis and the Tyrell Building in Blade Runner. Special effects supervisor David Dryer used stills from Metropolis when lining up Blade Runner's miniature building shots.The extended end scene in the original theatrical release shows Rachael and Deckard traveling into daylight with pastoral aerial shots filmed by director Stanley Kubrick. Ridley Scott contacted Kubrick about using some of his surplus helicopter aerial photography from The Shining.\n\nSpinner\n\"Spinner\" is the generic term for the fictional flying cars used in the film. A spinner can be driven as a ground-based vehicle, and take off vertically, hover, and cruise much like vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft. They are used extensively by the police as patrol cars, and wealthy people can also acquire spinner licenses. The vehicle was conceived and designed by Syd Mead who described the spinner as an aerodyne – a vehicle which directs air downward to create lift, though press kits for the film stated that the spinner was propelled by three engines: \"conventional internal combustion, jet, and anti-gravity\". A spinner is on permanent exhibit at the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in Seattle, Washington. Mead's conceptual drawings were transformed into 25 vehicles by automobile customizer Gene Winfield; at least two were working ground vehicles, while others were light-weight mockups for crane shots and set decoration for street shots. Two of them ended up at Disney World in Orlando, Florida, but were later destroyed, and a few others remain in private collections.\n\nVoight-Kampff machine\nThe Voight-Kampff machine is a fictional interrogation tool, originating from the novel (where it is spelled \"Voigt-Kampff\"). The Voight-Kampff is a polygraph-like machine used by blade runners to determine whether an individual is a replicant. It measures bodily functions such as respiration, blush response, heart rate and eye movement in response to questions dealing with empathy.\n\nMusic\nThe Blade Runner soundtrack by Vangelis is a dark melodic combination of classic composition and futuristic synthesizers which mirrors the film noir retro-future envisioned by Scott. Vangelis, fresh from his Academy Award-winning score for Chariots of Fire, composed and performed the music on his synthesizers. He also made use of various chimes and the vocals of collaborator Demis Roussos. Another memorable sound is the tenor sax solo \"Love Theme\" by British saxophonist Dick Morrissey, who performed on many of Vangelis's albums. Ridley Scott also used \"Memories of Green\" from the Vangelis album See You Later, an orchestral version of which Scott would later use in his film Someone to Watch Over Me.Along with Vangelis's compositions and ambient textures, the film's soundscape also features a track by the Japanese ensemble Nipponia – \"Ogi no Mato\" or \"The Folding Fan as a Target\" from the Nonesuch Records release Traditional Vocal and Instrumental Music – and a track by harpist Gail Laughton from \"Harps of the Ancient Temples\" on Laurel Records.Despite being well received by fans and critically acclaimed and nominated in 1982 for a BAFTA and Golden Globe as best original score, and the promise of a soundtrack album from Polydor Records in the end titles of the film, the release of the official soundtrack recording was delayed for over a decade. There are two official releases of the music from Blade Runner. In light of the lack of a release of an album, the New American Orchestra recorded an orchestral adaptation in 1982 which bore little resemblance to the original. Some of the film tracks would, in 1989, surface on the compilation Vangelis: Themes, but not until the 1992 release of the Director's Cut version would a substantial amount of the film's score see commercial release.These delays and poor reproductions led to the production of many bootleg recordings over the years. A bootleg tape surfaced in 1982 at science fiction conventions and became popular given the delay of an official release of the original recordings, and in 1993 \"Off World Music, Ltd\" created a bootleg CD that would prove more comprehensive than Vangelis' official CD in 1994. A set with three CDs of Blade Runner-related Vangelis music was released in 2007. Titled Blade Runner Trilogy, the first disc contains the same tracks as the 1994 official soundtrack release, the second features previously unreleased music from the movie, and the third disc is all newly composed music from Vangelis, inspired by, and in the spirit of the movie.\n\nSpecial effects\nThe film's special effects are generally recognized to be among the best of all time, using the available (non-digital) technology to the fullest. Special effects engineers who worked on the film are often praised for the innovative technology they used to produce and design certain aspects of those visuals. In addition to matte paintings and models, the techniques employed included multipass exposures. In some scenes, the set was lit, shot, the film rewound, and then rerecorded over with different lighting. In some cases this was done 16 times in all. The cameras were frequently motion controlled using computers. Many effects used techniques which had been developed during the production of Close Encounters of the Third Kind.\n\nRelease\nTheatrical run\nBlade Runner was released in 1,290 theaters on June 25, 1982. That date was chosen by producer Alan Ladd Jr. because his previous highest-grossing films (Star Wars and Alien) had a similar opening date (May 25) in 1977 and 1979, making the 25th of the month his \"lucky day\". Blade Runner grossed reasonably good ticket sales in its opening weekend; earning $6.1 million during its first weekend in theaters. The film was released close to other major science-fiction and fantasy releases such as The Thing, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Conan the Barbarian and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, which affected its commercial success.\n\nVersions\nSeveral versions of Blade Runner have been shown. The original workprint version (1982, 113 minutes) was shown for audience test previews in Denver and Dallas in March 1982. Negative responses to the previews led to the modifications resulting in the U.S. theatrical version. The workprint was shown as a director's cut without Scott's approval at the Los Angeles Fairfax Theater in May 1990, at an AMPAS showing in April 1991, and in September and October 1991 at the Los Angeles NuArt Theater and the San Francisco Castro Theatre. Positive responses pushed the studio to approve work on an official director's cut. A San Diego Sneak Preview was shown only once, in May 1982, and was almost identical to the U.S. theatrical version but contained three extra scenes not shown in any other version, including the 2007 Final Cut.Two versions were shown in the film's 1982 theatrical release: the U.S. theatrical version (117 minutes), known as the original version or Domestic Cut (released on Betamax, CED Videodisc and VHS in 1983, and on LaserDisc in 1987), and the International Cut (117 minutes), also known as the \"Criterion Edition\" or \"uncut version\", which included more violent action scenes than the U.S. version. Although initially unavailable in the U.S. and distributed in Europe and Asia via theatrical and local Warner Home Video releases, the International Cut was later released on VHS and The Criterion Collection Laserdisc in North America, and re-released in 1992 as a \"10th Anniversary Edition\".Ridley Scott's Director's Cut (1992, 116 minutes) had significant changes from the theatrical version including the removal of Deckard's voice-over, the re-insertion of the unicorn sequence, and the removal of the studio-imposed happy ending. Scott provided extensive notes and consultation to Warner Bros. through film preservationist Michael Arick, who was put in charge of creating the Director's Cut.Scott's definitive The Final Cut (2007, 117 minutes) was released by Warner Bros. theatrically on October 5, 2007, and subsequently released on DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-ray Disc in December 2007. This is the only version over which Scott had complete artistic and editorial control.\n\nReception\nCritical response\nOn Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an 89% approval rating based on 126 reviews, with an average rating of 8.50/10. The website's critics consensus reads, \"Misunderstood when it first hit theaters, the influence of Ridley Scott's mysterious, neo-noir Blade Runner has deepened with time. A visually remarkable, achingly human sci-fi masterpiece.\" Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 84 out of 100 based on 15 critics, indicating \"universal acclaim\".Initial reactions among film critics were mixed. Some wrote that the plot took a back seat to the film's special effects and did not fit the studio's marketing as an action and adventure film. Others acclaimed its complexity and predicted it would stand the test of time. Negative criticism in the United States cited its slow pace. Sheila Benson from the Los Angeles Times called it \"Blade Crawler\", and Pat Berman in The State and Columbia Record described it as \"science fiction pornography\". Pauline Kael praised Blade Runner as worthy of a place in film history for its distinctive sci-fi vision, yet criticized the film's lack of development in \"human terms\". Ares magazine said, \"Misunderstood by audiences and critics alike, it is by far the best science fiction film of the year.\"\n\nCultural analysis\nAcademics began analyzing the film almost as soon as it was released. One of the first books on the film was Paul M. Sammon's Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner (1996), which dissects all the details concerning the film making. He was followed by Scott Bukatman's Blade Runner and other books and academic articles. In Postmodern Metanarratives: Blade Runner and Literature in the Age of Image, Décio Torres Cruz analyzes the philosophical and psychological issues and the literary influences in Blade Runner. He examines the film's cyberpunk and dystopic elements by establishing a link between the Biblical, classical and modern traditions and the postmodern aspects in the film's collage of several literary texts.The boom in home video formats helped establish a growing cult around the film, which scholars have dissected for its dystopic aspects, questions regarding \"authentic\" humanity, ecofeminist aspects and use of conventions from multiple genres. Popular culture began to reassess its impact as a classic several years after it was released. Roger Ebert praised the visuals of both the original and the Director's Cut and recommended it for that reason; however, he found the human story clichéd and a little thin. He later added The Final Cut to his \"Great Movies\" list. Critic Chris Rodley and Janet Maslin theorized that Blade Runner changed cinematic and cultural discourse through its image repertoire and subsequent influence on films. In 2012, Time film critic Richard Corliss surgically analyzed the durability, complexity, screenplay, sets and production dynamics from a personal, three-decade perspective. Denis Villeneuve, who directed the sequel, Blade Runner 2049, cites the film as a huge influence for him and many others.It has also been noted for its postmodernist approach and that it contributes to the historical development of modern dystopia in film. Furthermore, the futuristic version of Los Angeles has been widely discussed by academics with some comparing it to Milton's descriptions of hell in Paradise Lost. A 2019 retrospective in the BBC argued that elements of the film's socio-political themes remained prescient in the real year of the film's setting, such as its depiction of climate change. From a more philosophical perspective, Alison Landsberg described Scott's direction of the film as a \"prosthetic memory\"—an action that has never happened and appears to be divorced from lived experience, yet it defines personhood and identity within the wider Blade Runner universe.\n\nAwards and nominations\nBlade Runner won or received nominations for the following awards:\n\nThemes\nThe film operates on multiple dramatic and narrative levels. It employs some of the conventions of film noir, among them the character of a femme fatale; narration by the protagonist (in the original release); chiaroscuro cinematography; and giving the hero a questionable moral outlook – extended to include reflections upon the nature of his own humanity. It is a literate science fiction film, thematically enfolding the philosophy of religion and moral implications of human mastery of genetic engineering in the context of classical Greek drama and hubris. It also draws on Biblical images, such as Noah's flood, and literary sources, such as Frankenstein and William Blake. Although Scott said any similarity was merely coincidental, fans claimed that the chess game between Sebastian and Tyrell was based on the famous Immortal Game of 1851.Blade Runner delves into the effects of technology on the environment and society by reaching to the past, using literature, religious symbolism, classical dramatic themes, and film noir techniques. This tension between past, present, and future is represented in the \"retrofitted\" future depicted in the film, one which is high-tech and gleaming in places but decayed and outdated elsewhere. In an interview with The Observer in 2002, director Ridley Scott described the film as \"extremely dark, both literally and metaphorically, with an oddly masochistic feel\". He also said that he \"liked the idea of exploring pain\" in the wake of his brother's death: \"When he was ill, I used to go and visit him in London, and that was really traumatic for me.\"A sense of foreboding and paranoia pervades the world of the film: corporate power looms large; the police seem omnipresent; vehicle and warning lights probe into buildings; and the consequences of huge biomedical power over the individual are explored –\nespecially regarding replicants' implanted memories. The film depicts a world post ecocide, where warfare and capitalism have led to destruction of 'normal' ecological systems. Control over the environment is exercised on a vast scale, and goes hand in hand with the absence of any natural life; for example, artificial animals stand in for their extinct predecessors. This oppressive backdrop explains the frequently referenced migration of humans to \"off-world\" (extraterrestrial) colonies. Eyes are a recurring motif, as are manipulated images, calling into question the nature of reality and our ability to accurately perceive and remember it.These thematic elements provide an atmosphere of uncertainty for Blade Runner's central theme of examining humanity. In order to discover replicants, an empathy test is used, with a number of its questions focused on the treatment of animals – seemingly an essential indicator of one's \"humanity\". Replicants will not respond the same way humans would, showing a lack of concern. The film goes so far as to question if Deckard might be a replicant, in the process asking the audience to re-evaluate what it means to be human.The question of whether Deckard is intended to be a human or a replicant has been an ongoing controversy since the film's release. Both Michael Deeley and Harrison Ford wanted Deckard to be human, while Hampton Fancher preferred ambiguity. Ridley Scott has stated that in his vision, Deckard is a replicant. Deckard's unicorn-dream sequence, inserted into Scott's Director's Cut and concomitant with Gaff's parting gift of an origami unicorn, is seen by many as showing that Deckard is a replicant – because Gaff could have retrieved Deckard's implanted memories. The interpretation that Deckard is a replicant is challenged by others who believe the unicorn imagery shows that the characters, whether human or replicant, share the same dreams and recognize their affinity, or that the absence of a decisive answer is crucial to the film's main theme. The film's inherent ambiguity and uncertainty, as well as its textual richness, have permitted multiple interpretations.\n\nLegacy\nCultural impact\nWhile not initially a success with North American audiences, Blade Runner was popular internationally and garnered a cult following. The film's dark style and futuristic designs have served as a benchmark and its influence can be seen in many subsequent science fiction films, video games, anime, and television programs. For example, Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, the producers of the re-imagining of Battlestar Galactica, have both cited Blade Runner as one of the major influences for the show.The film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1993 and is frequently taught in university courses. In 2007, it was named the second-most visually influential film of all time by the Visual Effects Society. The film has also been the subject of parody, such as the comics Blade Bummer by Crazy comics, Bad Rubber by Steve Gallacci, and the Red Dwarf 2009 three-part miniseries \"Back to Earth\". The anime series Psycho-Pass by Production I.G was also highly influenced by the movie.Blade Runner continues to reflect modern trends and concerns, and an increasing number of critics consider it one of the greatest science fiction films of all time. It was voted the best science fiction film ever made in a 2004 poll of 60 eminent world scientists. Blade Runner is also cited as an important influence to both the style and story of the Ghost in the Shell franchise, which itself has been highly influential to the future-noir genre. Blade Runner has been very influential to the cyberpunk movement. It also influenced the cyberpunk derivative biopunk, which revolves around biotechnology and genetic engineering.The dialogue and music in Blade Runner has been sampled in music more than any other film of the 20th century. The 2009 album I, Human by Singaporean band Deus Ex Machina makes numerous references to the genetic engineering and cloning themes from the film, and even features a track titled \"Replicant\".Blade Runner is cited as a major influence on Warren Spector, designer of the video game Deus Ex, which displays evidence of the film's influence in both its visual rendering and plot. Indeed, the film's look – and in particular its overall darkness, preponderance of neon lights and opaque visuals – are easier to render than complicated backdrops, making it a popular reference point for video game designers. It has influenced adventure games such as the 2012 graphical text adventure Cypher, Rise of the Dragon, Snatcher, the Tex Murphy series, Beneath a Steel Sky, Flashback: The Quest for Identity, Bubblegum Crisis video games (and their original anime), the role-playing game Shadowrun, the first-person shooter Perfect Dark, the shooter game Skyhammer, and the Syndicate series of video games.The logos of Atari, Bell, Coca-Cola, Cuisinart, Pan Am, and RCA, all market leaders at the time, were prominently displayed as product placement in the film, and all experienced setbacks after the film's release, leading to suggestions of a Blade Runner curse. Coca-Cola and Cuisinart recovered, and Tsingtao beer was also featured in the film and was more successful after the film than before.The design of Tesla's Cybertruck was inspired by the film. Prior to its release Elon Musk promised that it would \"look like something out of Blade Runner\". Besides referring to the truck as the \"Blade Runner Truck\", Musk chose to debut the truck in order to coincide with the film's setting of November 2019. The film's art designer Syd Mead praised the truck and said he was \"flattered\" by the homage to Blade Runner.\n\nMedia recognition\nAmerican Film Institute recognition\nAFI's 100 Years...100 Thrills – No. 74\nAFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – No. 97\nAFI's 10 Top 10 – No. 6 Science Fiction Film\n\nIn other media\nBefore filming began, Cinefantastique magazine commissioned Paul M. Sammon to write a special issue about Blade Runner's production which became the book Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner. The book chronicles Blade Runner's evolution, focusing on film-set politics, especially the British director's experiences with his first American film crew; of which producer Alan Ladd, Jr. has said, \"Harrison wouldn't speak to Ridley and Ridley wouldn't speak to Harrison. By the end of the shoot Ford was 'ready to kill Ridley', said one colleague. He really would have taken him on if he hadn't been talked out of it.\" Future Noir has short cast biographies and quotations about their experiences as well as photographs of the film's production and preliminary sketches. A second edition of Future Noir was published in 2007, and additional materials not in either print edition have been published online.Philip K. Dick refused a $400,000 offer to write a Blade Runner novelization, saying: \"⁠[I was] told the cheapo novelization would have to appeal to the twelve-year-old audience\" and it \"would have probably been disastrous to me artistically\". He added, \"That insistence on my part of bringing out the original novel and not doing the novelization – they were just furious. They finally recognized that there was a legitimate reason for reissuing the novel, even though it cost them money. It was a victory not just of contractual obligations but of theoretical principles.\" Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was eventually reprinted as a tie-in, with the film poster as a cover and the original title in parentheses below the Blade Runner title. Additionally, a novelization of the movie entitled Blade Runner: A Story of the Future by Les Martin was released in 1982. Archie Goodwin scripted the comic book adaptation, A Marvel Comics Super Special: Blade Runner, published in September 1982, which was illustrated by Al Williamson, Carlos Garzon, Dan Green, and Ralph Reese, and lettered by Ed King.Blue Dolphin Enterprises published the film's screenplay combined with selected production storyboards as The Illustrated Blade Runner (June 1982); a book of original production artwork by Syd Mead, Mentor Huebner, Charles Knode, Michael Kaplan, and Ridley Scott as Blade Runner Sketchbook (1982); and The Blade Runner Portfolio (1982), a collection of twelve photographic prints, similar to the artist portfolios released by their Schanes & Schanes imprint.There are two video games based on the film, both titled Blade Runner: one from 1985, a side-scrolling video game for Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and Amstrad CPC by CRL Group PLC, which is marked as \"a video game interpretation of the film score by Vangelis\" rather than of the film itself (due to licensing issues); and another from 1997, a point-and-click adventure for PC by Westwood Studios. The 1997 game has a non-linear plot based in the Blade Runner world, non-player characters that each ran in their own independent AI, and an unusual pseudo-3D engine (which eschewed polygonal solids in favor of voxel elements) that did not require the use of a 3D accelerator card to play the game. Eldon Tyrell, Gaff, Leon, Rachael, Chew, J. F. Sebastian and Howie Lee appear, and their voice files are recorded by the original actors, with the exception of Gaff, who is replaced by Javier Grajeda (as Victor Gardell) and Howie Lee, who is replaced by Toru Nagai. The player assumes the role of McCoy, another replicant-hunter working at the same time as Deckard.The television film (and later series) Total Recall 2070 was initially planned as a spin-off of the film Total Recall (based on Philip K. Dick's short story \"We Can Remember It for You Wholesale\"), but was produced as a hybrid of Total Recall and Blade Runner. Many similarities between Total Recall 2070 and Blade Runner were noted, as well as apparent influences on the show from Isaac Asimov's The Caves of Steel and the TV series Holmes & Yoyo.\n\nDocumentaries\nThe film has been the subject of several documentaries.\n\nBlade Runner: Convention Reel (1982, 13 minutes)\nCo-directed by Muffet Kaufman and Jeffrey B. Walker, shot and screened in 16 mm, featured no narrator, was filmed in 1981 while Blade Runner was still in production and featured short \"behind-the-scenes\" segments showing sets being built and sequences being shot, as well as interviews with Ridley Scott, Syd Mead and Douglas Trumbull. Appears on the Blade Runner Ultimate Collector's Edition.On the Edge of Blade Runner (2000, 55 minutes)\nDirected by Andrew Abbott and hosted/written by Mark Kermode. Interviews with production staff, including Scott, give details of the creative process and the turmoil during preproduction. Insights into Philip K. Dick and the origins of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? are provided by Paul M. Sammon and Hampton Fancher.\nFuture Shocks (2003, 27 minutes)\nDirected by TVOntario. It includes interviews with executive producer Bud Yorkin, Syd Mead, and the cast, and commentary by science fiction author Robert J. Sawyer and from film critics.\nDangerous Days: Making Blade Runner (2007, 213 minutes)\nDirected and produced by Charles de Lauzirika for The Final Cut version of the film. Its source material comprises more than 80 interviews, including extensive conversations with Ford, Young, and Scott. The documentary is presented in eight chapters, with each of the first seven covering a portion of the filmmaking process. The final chapter examines Blade Runner's controversial legacy.\nAll Our Variant Futures: From Workprint to Final Cut (2007, 29 minutes)\nProduced by Paul Prischman, appears on the Blade Runner Ultimate Collector's Edition and provides an overview of the film's multiple versions and their origins, as well as detailing the seven-year-long restoration, enhancement and remastering process behind The Final Cut.\n Blade Runner Phenomenon (2021, 53 minutes)\nDirected by Boris Hars-Tschachotin and made by the France and Germany European public service channel ARTE, this documentary informs viewers using behind-the-scenes material from various sets, photos, original locations in Los Angeles, and interviews with those involved in the production.\n\nSequel and related media\nA sequel was released in 2017, titled Blade Runner 2049, with Ryan Gosling alongside Ford in the starring roles. It entered production in mid-2016 and is set decades after the first film. Harrison Ford reprised his role as Rick Deckard. The film won two Academy Awards, for cinematography and visual effects.The world of Blade Runner has also come to be explored in animation. Blade Runner 2049 was preceded by the release of three short films that served as prequels, where the chronological first, Blade Runner Black Out 2022, was anime (the other two, 2036: Nexus Dawn and 2048: Nowhere to Run, were live action, not animated).In November 2021, a Japanese-American anime television series called Blade Runner: Black Lotus was released. The series tells the story of a female replicant protagonist, rather than that of a male Blade Runner one.Dick's friend K. W. Jeter wrote three authorized Blade Runner novels that continue Rick Deckard's story, attempting to resolve the differences between the film and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? These are Blade Runner 2: The Edge of Human (1995), Blade Runner 3: Replicant Night (1996), and Blade Runner 4: Eye and Talon (2000)\nBlade Runner cowriter David Peoples wrote the 1998 action film Soldier, which he referred to as a \"sidequel\" or spiritual successor to the original film; the two are set in a shared universe. A bonus feature on the Blu-ray for Prometheus, the 2012 film by Scott set in the Alien universe, states that Eldon Tyrell, CEO of the Blade Runner Tyrell Corporation, was the mentor of Guy Pearce's character Peter Weyland.In late 2022, Amazon announced a Blade Runner 2049 sequel series would be produced. On October 12, 2022, an apparent official approval to actually make a Blade Runner 2099 TV series was reported.\n\nSee also\nBlade Runner (franchise)\nArcology\nBiorobotics\nList of dystopian films\nList of fictional robots and androids\nSynthetic biology\nTech noir\n\nNotes",6  "char_len": 71030,7  "document_hash": "96979b86b4a0485b2074d8e163f8f68d4f2fdefd8e547a588cd96b7b89d5119f",8  "questions": [9    {10      "question_id": "q00",11      "qtype": "hotpotqa",12      "question": "Morgan Paull played Dave Holden in a 1982 film loosely adapted from a novel by what author?"13    }14  ]15}