8 Roy Batty – Blade Runner (1982) – 64 points
Is it okay to be sincere in these threads? I'm not sure whether or not I should volunteer the info that this scene has made me tear up many times.
And, Anais,
thank you for
not taking the clip from the '82 theatrical cut! Just at the height of this powerful, moving scene, Ford's narration comes in & kills it flat. The studios couldn't trust audiences to understand that Deckard was contemplating what just happened, so they forced him to add some boneheaded narration stating the obvious. "And that's when I understood..."
Sad Factor: High. Much like my opinion of HAL (of which Compound’s write up was great, but I stand by my view) Roy was a machine that got feelings.
Don't think me nitpicky, but Roy & his gang were replicants, not machines. The difference being, as I understand it, replicants are organic beings, not mechanical or A.I.. They were built, "but not to last". Before Roy crushes his skull, his maker Tyrell refers to him as a "prodigal son" and describes his strength & lifespan with:
"The candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long."Basically they're built to be disposable ubermenches for various forms of slave labor. Roy's story, before Deckard butts in, is that of a man who seeks to meet his maker, and when he finally comes to the truth that his life can't be prolonged, kills his maker. The big difference between the '91 director's cut & the 2006 version is that Tyrell's changed metaphorically from a Creator to a father figure. Personally, I think there's more resonance in the idea of killing your god, but when there's multiple versions of a film we tend to stick with the version we grew up watching. One major line change as Roy's confronting Tyrell:
1991 cut: "I want more life, fucker."
2006 cut: "I want more life,
father."
I neglected to put Tyrell's death on my list, but it gives me goosebumps every time.
TYRELL: "Go, revel in your time!"
ROY: "Nothing the god of biomechanics won't let you in heaven for?"
And Roy proceeds, violently & movingly, to revel in his time.
Hope you don't mind me making serious points about Blade Runner. I've been on a run of too many cheap bad jokes lately.
One thing that def happens when you give robots feelings…they want to LIVE!!!!!!!!!
Please don't tell me that last line is alluding to Michael Clarke Duncan in The Island! "The island, *SOB* YOU PROMISED!!! *SOB*
IWannaLive!!!*SOB DROOL*"
Topic: Top 50 Deaths! (Entire thread has been marked NSFW) (Read 50793 times)
