Pin sharp Blade Runner
JAMES Burgess is a 27-year-old performance, drama and theatre graduate. The former Fallibroome High School pupil has attended the BAFTA Film Awards in London every year since 2009, meeting stars such as Dame Helen Mirren, Christian Bale, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emma Thompson. James lives on St Ives Close in Macclesfield. You can visit his website at jabfilmreviews. blogspot. com. Blade Runner 2049 (12A, 164 mins) Columbia Pictures Rating: THIRTY-FIVE years after the master of dazzling scale, Ridley Scott, genuinely redefined the sci-fi genre forever with the original Blade Runner in 1982, we’re still wondering if Harrison Ford’s despondent detective Deckard is one of the robots he hunts down.
Now directorial control that couldn’t be more sacred to the devoted fandom is handed to Denis Villeneuve.
Villeneuve’s status as the master of constructing tense, sparse, simple, ominously-built atmosphere is fast becoming unparalleled.
Whether it’s the desolate isolation of the mist in the landscape where Hugh Jackman’s child is abducted in Prisoners, the relentless shredding of Emily Blunt’s adrenaline powering through the war-on-drugs on the unforgiving Mexican border in Sicario, or the indeterminable drones of an alien species deciphered by Amy Adams’ linguist in Arrival. No immersive nerve is left untested - whatever kind of environment we’re inhabiting.
The visuals here couldn’t be any more sumptuously poetic: epic, panoramic cityscape vistas of monolithic proportion – and stunningly realised ambition. Instead of perpetual rainstorms and dry-ice, this one takes sleek, threat-laden futurism into the absorbing stratosphere.
Production designer Dennis Gassner’s (Into The Woods, Skyfall) sets are shot with pin-sharp, skill by prolific cinematographer Roger Deakins (The Coen Bros. and Revolutionary Road). From the chill of clouds to the searingly vivid, orange burn of a white-hot wasteland. It’s spoiling nothing to say that Ryan Gosling’s Agent K might also be a robot, but why is he, as always, so utterly, blankly vacuous? I found it impossible to connect emotionally. Harrison Ford’s much-awaited reprisal is reliable, in that crumpled, grumpy look of permanent incredulity he does so well. Jared Leto’s illusive, if underused new villain is very subtly ruthless, and Sylvia Hoeks completely steals it as his icily lethal assistant. There’s also more of that revolutionary CGI resurrection - used so well in TRON and bringing Peter Cushing back to life in Rogue One. Hans Zimmer’s customarily propulsive score lacerates us even further. I just wanted more shock, surprise and substance beneath the aesthetic awe.