The first thing that needs to be said about Bladerunner 2049 is that it is not a typical Hollywood blockbuster – those who go in expecting an upping of the action quotient, quickening of the pace from the methodical pacing of the original and a Gosling/Ford tag team smashing their way through adversaries left, right and centre may want to readjust their expectations going in.
Typical sequel thinking would see a marked rise in the number of big action sequences, a different tempo to the original and possibly even expanding the world as well, but as it is Bladerunner 2049 is happy enough to follow the lead of it’s predecessor that pitched a neo noir detective story into a bleak industrial landscape. There is an inherent danger when doing sequels to highly regarded films especially when a fair amount of time has passed by – one criticism of The Force Awakens was that it traded too heavily on past glories, whereas Bryan Singers Superman Returns was criticised in some quarters for being too much of a love letter to the original to be its own film – fortunately the script by Hampton Fincher, with additional work by Michael Green, manages to extend on the themes from the original whilst extending the story organically enough for the film to stand on it’s own as well as function as a sequel. It keeps its references to Bladerunner fleeting without feeling forced when they do occur, with a story that doesn’t depend on dragging back old characters for the sake of it or purely filling out the background in a scene, even if the developing plot does eventually lead back to Deckard and Mackenzie Davis’s Mariette appearance heavily references that of Pris from the original film to note the main two such occurrences.
From the outset the story pitches itself into continuing that detective theme, with Ryan Gosling’s Agent K having tracked down Dave Batista’s Sapper Morton with instructions to retire him, as was the case with the replicants in the original Bladerunner – that opening confrontation opens the way to an unfolding of a mystery that reaches both into the past and potential future for both human and replicant alike. Rather than expand the world that the film takes place in, as might be expected for a follow up, the story is much more focussed around Agent K and his existence as well as his actions as the mystery he discovers begins to unfold.
Matching the visuals which became so iconic and visionary in the original film was always going to be a tough ask, one which being undertaken by Roger Deakens, already with 13 nominations for the Academy Award for best cinematography, a number which should be increased to fourteen in the not too distant future, if not a first win of the award for his work here. 30 years may have passed since the original both in real life and storytelling terms but the future Los Angeles landscape hasn’t improved for the better – although the skyline may not be shorn of the flame spewing industrial chimneys of the first film it is still dominated by enormous skyscrapers, with some of the bright neon advertising colourfully juxtaposing itself against the darker rain and snow strewn streets below, with little to suggest that society has improved for the better for the many in the intervening years.
An opening expedition outside of Los Angeles into the barren Californian countryside doesn’t offer anything much more in the way of hope for a rejuvenated earth, with miles of farming tents covering the landscape almost giving it an otherworldly pale feel and texture. Both of these settings are marked contrasts to the golden lights and hues that swathe around next generation replicant creator Niander Wallace’s headquarters and in particular his own offices and chambers, giving it a near heavenly glow as well as echoing both Egyptian pyramids and tombs. The sense of a higher place is emphasised further by his referencing of his replicant creations as angels, as demonstrated when one such “newborn” is slides out of a protective sack under a bright white light shining down upon her as if descended from a heavenly plane of existence.
It wasn’t just for it’s stunning visuals that Bladerunner became noteworthy, more in the years after it’s release at least, as it’s soundtrack became iconic on it’s own thanks to the electric synth compositions of Vangelis, here replicated and echoed in part by Hans Zimmer and Benjamin Wallfisch’s soundtrack which also makes effective use of a seemingly elongated single word Gregorian style chant at times in the film, as well as the themes than ran throughout it, of empathy, being human, the wish to be human or treated as one and the basic yearning and desire to extend life and not have to face death. All of these permeate the story for the sequel as well as those of loneliness and isolation too at times, exemplified by K’s homelife, a situation that is as artificially created as the replicants he has been hunting. With a projection system used to glorify his meals and to give him a female companion, who is more compassionate and understanding to him than any of the other humans he is surrounded by or indeed the various replicants who see him as an enemy against his own kind given his Bladerunner status.
With so much of the story focussed on him it’s fortunate that Gosling is at his best throughout, with some of the quieter scenes harking back to his highly regarded turn in Drive, with some notable small details that he brings to the role alongside some of the more emotional moments that the developing story demands. Besides Gosling, Ana de Armas deserves mention and Ford easily slips back into the role of Deckard, albeit an older and unsurprisingly changed man after the events between the two films. Overall Denis Villeneuve gets uniformly excellent performances from his cast and keeps a balanced tone throughout, although there may be some debate of Leto’s portrayal although it shouldn’t prove to be anywhere near as divisive as his Joker was in Suicide Squad.
With themes and pacing similar to the original film those who found those as faults or criticisms of the original Bladerunner will probably find themselves echoing them again, moreso the pacing given the trailers did hint towards more action in the film than was present. There is one aspect of the developing mystery that may seem a stretch even for futuristic sci fi such as this and if the film does lack something compared to the original it’s though Sylvia Hoeks’ Luv has enough drive and emirates enough presence to be a real threat throughout she is more of a henchwoman and doesn’t have the philosophical depth or sense of drive and purpose that Rutger Hauer or Darryl Hannah had in Ridley Scott’s original. As it stands though, Bladerunner 2049 is a film that still has you thinking and deliberating about it for some time after you leave the cinema, due to it being a far more emotionally themed and layered sequel that many had dared hope it would or even could be, proving to be at the very least an equal of it’s predecessor and a more than worthy successor to one of the more cherished sci fi films in cinematic history.
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