The Summer Movie Megathread

june gloom on 14/8/2013 at 07:55

Actually I always thought Blade Runner's theme was what it means to be human. The new wrinkle introduced in the Director's Cut bears this out.

Sulphur on 14/8/2013 at 07:58

The original PKD story certainly was about that. I'm parsing BR's primary theme as mortality for the sake of discussion, though.

Briareos H on 14/8/2013 at 08:33

Quote Posted by Sulphur

Regarding clones

The clones in Oblivion are all the same age, they are not grown biologically or else we would see them at different stages of growth inside the mothership. They also possess the same memories, which were then artificially repressed around the time of "hatching". This all suggests that those clones are exact duplicates of their originals on an atomic or sub-atomic level, and this in turn suggests that the foe is some kind of quantum-level universal replicator race (which is *also* a reused idea).
With that in mind, I instantly assumed all clones shared the same atomic structure, especially that their cerebral patterns were identical. As far as science and human knowledge goes, this is all you need to make two people <strike>virtually</strike>literally the same.

Now this has been said, I understand that you criticize the film's message on a philosophical, almost religious assumption. That's fine, but you shouldn't assume that everyone should be annoyed by it. I personally do not share your view on human identity. My beliefs are that the "soul", ie. what guarantees the uniqueness of a person, exists on an atomic level in the structure of the brain patterns and sensory I/O, a structure that was established by both years of biological growth and years of learning and memories. You say that love isn't so easily so transferable to different beings, I say that love can be equally shared among all instances of the same being.
Julia saw the original in Jack 49, she recognized all his little quirks, the way he talked, his behavioral patterns - I don't think we as humans need much more to establish/fool ourselves into believing (whichever term you prefer as they are indistinguishable and only a problem on a rhetoric level) that they are the same person. Think of it as the QBRM 'resurrection machines' in System Shock 2 - Would you say that it was not the main character who destroyed SHODAN at the end but a different person?

As for the time spent during the movie with 49 and the shared experience that 52 will never have, I agree with you. However, considering how little time they spent together, I'm more than willing to assume that her thinking went along the lines of "okay, baby needs a father, the last clone I accepted as a husband *was* my husband, this one might go a little awkward, but we'll take some time to get reacquainted, he's still my husband after all". I'm of course putting an intent behind the screenwriter, but this reasoning felt quite natural to me. In my opinion, the point of the movie *was* that those instances are disposable as long as you don't run out of them because they're indeed the same guy (perfect for Tom Cruise's ego). Slight differences exist, one might find a book and be triggered to do something while others don't, one might share some sexy time more than the others before murdering a huge AI but ultimately these are details which don't matter much to his persona. This is how I interpreted the film, in my opinion an interesting idea which might just be the only original element it had. That's why I'm defending it.

faetal on 14/8/2013 at 09:01

I'm happy to hand over the discussion to BH as he is saying the things I want said, plus I hate using spoiler tags and quote markup at the same time - it's ball-ache ;)

As for what I'd do if I had several clones of the woman I love? I can think of quite a list actually.

june gloom on 14/8/2013 at 09:52

Probably at the top would be "have head explode"

... makes the rest of the list a bit moot

SubJeff on 14/8/2013 at 12:29

Oooh, Briareos H, I'm loving the quantum clone theory.

I thought that they were grown to a specific age and just kept in stasis til needed myself.

Fwiw - I think the film is absolutely about souls. Or the essence of humanity or whatever, if that is the soul.

catbarf on 15/8/2013 at 00:43

Quote Posted by dethtoll

I think the Final Cut is markedly better than the Director's Cut, personally.

You are correct, I'd forgotten the names of all the different versions. Probably the only example of a filmmaker going back to 'fix' an earlier work and actually fixing it, not fucking it up beyond all recognition. I'm looking at you, Lucas.

Fafhrd on 15/8/2013 at 02:17

Apropos to the Oblivion conversation:

[video=youtube;3rf5QwVAAxg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rf5QwVAAxg[/video]

Spoilers, obviously.

june gloom on 15/8/2013 at 06:45

Quote Posted by catbarf

It's interesting because he had very little input on the Director's Cut. The Final Cut is him going back and redoing it the way it should've been done.

N'Al on 15/8/2013 at 06:54

[video=youtube;OM6z9czN318]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM6z9czN318#at=128[/video]