Lambie's Guide to the Five Versions of "Blade Runner"

Yes, that's right. There are five versions of this iconic film, and I've seen all of them. Having so many different versions of a film available can make figuring out which one to watch difficult. Here, then, is may take on each version and why you should (or shouldn't) watch each one.

The U.S. Theatrical Cut: This is the original version of the film, complete with an entire checklist of things changed by the studio to try and make the film "better" for audiences. "Improvements" include voice overs that Harrison Ford seems to loath speaking, and a tacked on ending that you can tell has been tacked on. A lesson in what not to let studio executives do to a film. Verdict: Avoid.

The International Theatrical Cut: The U.S. Theatrical cut with a few more seconds of gore added. (I assume these precious seconds were cut in order to maintain the PG13 rating in the U.S., which would mean many more potential money-making audience members.) It doesn't make the film any worse, but it doesn't make the film any better, either.

The Director's Cut: Ridley Scott (and just about everyone else) hated what the studio originally did to his film, and perhaps rightly so. Ten years later, he managed to release the director's cut. Gone is the stupid ending and stupid voice-overs. Introduced is footage which famously changes the entire meaning of the (now) final scene and which has spawned never-ending debate. You could watch this version, but there's actually a better one.

The Workprint Cut: This existed only as a rumour until a few years ago. This is the version that was screened to a test audience and then disappeared off the face of the planet. You could think of it as a kind of bridge between the theatrical cuts and the director's cut. Incomplete special effects. Alternate takes. Alternate voice overs. Everything you'd ever want in a bootleg, really. Ridley Scott finally managed to dig it up and release it. It hasn't been altered apart from a restoration effort, so those incomplete special effects are still incomplete. Watch only if you're interested in the history of the film.

The Final Cut: Essentially a re-mastered directors cut (plus the few extra seconds of gore that the international cut had). Thus, this is the version to watch. The print has been overhauled to look brand new and has been further touched up with CGI. Now, before you cry foul and point out that this is what George Lucas did to the original Star Wars trilogy to the point where he ruined it, Ridley Scott read the cinematic equivalent of "Don't Do What Donny Don't Does" and didn't do what Donny Don't did. I could have probably made that a bit clearer: George Lucas used CGI to touch up the original print and then went overboard by filling the frame with CGI crap and changing elements that perhaps didn't need to be changed. Ridley Scott digitally re-mastered the film, used CGI to fix a few special effects errors, and then left it at that.

So to summarise, avoid the theatrical cuts unless you're a film buff and avoid the workprint cut unless you're interested in the history of the film. You could watch the director's cut and see something fairly close to Ridley Scott's vision, but if you're going to do that you might as well watch the final cut instead and see the version that he's happy with.

3D: It's not Just a Gimmick, It's False Advertising (In A Good Way)

It's time to put on your thinking caps, thinking berets, thinking beanies, or other thinking headgear, because this post is going to delve into the mind-bending physics realm of dimensions. You have been warned! In the spirit of special features on DVDs, I've included some bonus content at the bottom which you can skip to if you don't want to risk taxing your brain.

Ask any small child how many dimensions we live in, and you're probably starting in the wrong place to do your research. Ask a slightly older child how many dimensions we live in, and they'd probably tell you "three" (left and right, forwards and backwards, up and down). Ask any decently educated person how many dimensions we live in, and they'll hopefully tell you "four" (x, y, z, and time). Ask a mathematics professor how many dimensions we live in, and they might say "four" (x, y, z, and time), or they might say "four" with a cheesy I've-just-told-a-bad-joke grin on their face (r, theta, phi, and time), or they might just give you a puzzled look and tell you not to bother them again. Ask a theoretical physicist how many dimensions we live in and they'll run away in tears claiming that they don't know because string theory hasn't been resolved properly yet but it might be 11. We're going to be working with the educated everyman's answer of "four" (x, y, z, and time).

For the purposes of padding out this post with extra information you all probably already know, we travel through the time dimension at a somewhat redundant rate of one second per second. And, of course, there's also the issue of relativity, which basically states that our concept of the passing of time depends on how fast we're going. Thankfully, since we aren't going to be staring at a television or movie screen while travelling at significant factions of the speed of light any time soon, we can ignore this little problem for the time being.

But why does time always get stuck as the last dimension on the list? What's to stop me from listing the four dimensions as time, x, y, and z. Or (if I ignore alphabetical order) as z, time, y, and x. Or as x, y, time, and z. (Do you see where I'm going with this now?) In the last example, z is the last (fourth) dimension, time is now the third dimension, and the only thing stopping me from doing this is something known as "Convention".

Any film or TV show that doesn't comprise of a single still picture exists in the first of these three newly re-ordered dimensions (x, y, time). So since these films portray three of the four dimensions we can experience, these films are all 3D already. By natural extension, when you go and see a so-called "3D" movie, it's actually a film presented in all four perceivable dimensions. And that's where the false advertising comes in: it should be called 4D, shouldn't it?

But it's not all bad. Sure, so-called "3D" films are more expensive to make and show, which can sometimes be reflected in higher ticket prices. But now you know that "2D" films are really 3D, and that "3D" films are really 4D. You're being given an extra dimension for free without the studios and executives realising it.

Don't tell them, though.



Bonus Content: Here's something to ponder on. When sound was introduced to the world of cinema, it quickly (i.e. within a few years) moved from becoming a silly gimmick to become a legitimate tool for film-makers to use to enhance and further their telling of a story. Similar things happened for the introduction of colour and the widescreen format. They were very quickly embraced by the audiences of the time.

3D, however, has been around for decades but hasn't moved on from the cheap gimmick status it was labelled with when it first hit our screens. It suffers from some similar technological difficulties that sound, colour, etc. would have had to deal with when they were first introduced. (For example, I would imagine that not many studios and cinemas would have been well equipped to deal with sound when it was first introduced). Yet these technological difficulties don't seem to be the root cause of the problem. Film-makers seem stuck in a situation where they feel compelled to stick in a cheap shot of an object hurtling towards the camera, because that's the horrible name that 3D has made for itself.

A film that utilises 3D as a legitimate cinematic tool to compliment the director's vision of a story is yet to surface. As far as I can tell, even if Avatar is using 3D in this way, it's ludicrous success and word-of-mouth rule that "you must see the film in 3D" aren't really helping the case of 3D. (I haven't seen Avatar because I refuse to see/read things that seem to be making money based purely on hype. Critics haven't been as kind to the film as the many audience members who have made the pilgrimage to a theatre equipped to show the film in 3D.)

Cinema buffs are going to remain cynical to 3D until a respected reviewer actually says "This film uses 3D as a tool to tell the story."