Blade Runner 2049 *** (2017, Ryan Gosling, Harrison Ford, Ana de Armas, Robin Wright, Jared Leto) – Movie Review

Director Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049 is a great looking movie, with amazing visuals and effects. It is thoughtful and intelligent sci-fi action, in the great tradition of the original, though of course, not surprisingly, inferior to it. How could it not be? It was Blade Runner!

Ryan Gosling relishes a huge, intense star role as new blade runner LAPD Officer K, who sets out to find his retired predecessor Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), missing for 30 years. Gosling and Ford fit the bill exactly. They are good but are they fascinating enough?

Ana de Armas is impressive as the kick-ass Joi, and Robin Wright is powerful as K’s boss, Lieutenant Joshi. But it is disappointing that Jared Leto has so little to do as evil mastermind Niander Wallace, and Dave Bautista (as Sapper Morton) and Hiam Abbass (as Freysa) are equally cursed in small roles.

Obviously, you can’t win. You can’t beat Blade Runner. They try hard but it’s a little too little and a little too late. Nevertheless, Blade Runner 2049 does have its appeal and attractions, most of them visual. Blade Runner 2049 plays very like Villeneuve’s Arrival. If you loved that, I guess you’ll probably like this.

The all-important screenplay is by Hampton Fancher and Michael Green, from Fancher’s story. It is fairly inventive, involving and interesting, but I’m wondering if it is strong enough to support this 163-minute movie.

However, Villeneuve certainly makes up for any shortcomings by dressing up the story beautifully. It is a total eyeful from start to finish. The hero here is veteran English cinematographer Roger Deakins, who has so far received 13 Oscar nominations for Best Cinematography. Maybe this time, he will actually win! [He did and he went on to win another for the WW1 war film 1917 (2019)]

I should also mention the brilliance of production designer Dennis Gassner’s sets. They are absolutely splendid. Gassner has already won a (shared) Oscar for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration for Bugsy (1991). I imagine one at each of the mantlepiece would be as welcome as it is deserved.

It was nominated for five Oscars and won two – Best Achievement in Cinematography (Roger Deakins) and Best Achievement in Visual Effects (John Nelson, Gerd Nefzer, Paul Lambert and Richard R Hoover). It was nominated for Best Achievement in Production Design (Dennis Gassner, Alessandra Querzola), Best Achievement in Sound Editing and Best Achievement in Sound Mixing.

It also won Baftas for Best Cinematography and Best Achievement in Special Visual Effects. Dennis Gassner (production design) won the Technical Achievement award at the Year London Critics Circle Film Awards.

Denis Villeneuve went on to remake Dune (2021).

© Derek Winnert 2017 Movie Review

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