50/50x2: Blade Runner

When I get these 50 lists compiled I usually take a glance and try to leave at least one film for the very last that I think will knock my socks off.

During the first 50 list I definitely guessed correctly with Inglourious Basterds. On this list, I picked a pretty fair film, but not one that really blew me away.

Blade Runner is a film set in the 'not-so' distant future. The film was made in 1982 and the future is the year 2019. So, seeing as it is now 2012 and we are nowhere near the future this film is talking about, it was a little hard to believe. (sort of like Back to the Future II).

Anyway, in this future the human race has created replicants, or a replica for humans, that are much stronger than humans but usually have a small lifespan of about four years. These replicants have been placed on another planet away from Earth, but occasionally a few of them make it to the planet. When this happens, the police send out blade runners to track them down and retire them (or kill them).

One of the best blade runners, Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), is now retired but as six replicants high jack a spaceship and make it to Earth, police chief Bryant (M. Emmet Walsh) encourages him to go after the four that remain - Pris (Daryl Hannah), Leon (Brion James), Zhora (Joanna Cassidy) and their leader Roy (Rutger Hauer).

Deckard goes to the main who creates these replicants, Dr. Eldon Tyrell (Joe Turkel), to get more information and discovers that his assistant Rachael (Sean Young) is a new breed of replicant - one that does not she is because of memories inserted into her.

Once Bryant and Deckard's 'partner' Gaff (Edward James Olmos) finds out about Rachael - she is added to Deckard's list to retire - despite the fact that Deckard just may have feelings for her.

Would this film have been better in 1982? I can pretty much guarantee it. The special effects would have been amazing back then and 2019 was so far away at the time that this future may have been plausible.

Now, not so much. But, I still enjoyed the film. It just wasn't spectacular to me, like it may have been in the '80s - and like I have heard it should have been from many others.

Ford was, as usual, spectacular. I have heard the name Sean Young a ton, but honestly I don't really know her from much of anything except Ace Ventura, but she was also good as Rachael. Another standout to me was William Sanderson, who played J.F. Sebastian, a person that worked on the replicants that Pris locates to get close to Tyrell.

Finally, Hannah was pretty good as Pris, but her screen time was rather slim - Hauer, who I don't believe I had ever seen, was pretty over the top as the main bad guy. But, from an '80s film that is what we come to expect.

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HOT: Splash

Here we have the first teaming of what will eventually become many between Tom Hanks the actor and Ron Howard the director.

I remember really enjoying this film when I was younger, probably the first film where I started to like Tom Hanks.

Anyway, Splash stars Hanks as Allen Bauer. We first meet Allen on a ferry boat as a young child. He sees something in the water and decides to jump in despite not knowing how to swim. It is here that he meets a young Madison, who keeps him safe until he is saved.

Cut to years later and Allen is in charge of his family's produce business, along with his older brother, Freddie (John Candy). Freddie, however, is more into living than working, so most if not all of the business decisions are thrust upon Allen - add that to fact that his girlfriend has just left him and Allen is about to have a minor breakdown.

With that he decides to take an unplanned trip to Cape Cod, where he first met Madison (even though he thinks she might have been a figment of his imagination).

Allen rents a boat to take him across and we learn that he still has not learned how to swim. Of course, he falls out of the boat and gets hit in the head by the boat. Madison (Daryl Hannah) rescues him yet again.

During her rescue, Allen drops his wallet and Madison gets it off the ocean floor - oh, and Madison just so happens to be a mermaid.

She uses his licence to get his address and tracks him down. Despite not knowing how to speak, Allen takes her in and immediately begins to fall in love with her. She does learn English, however, by watching television and the love affair between Allen and Madison begin. She is, however, keeping this one major secret from him.

Meanwhile, Walter Kornbluth (Eugene Levy) is trying to track down Madison to prove that mermaids exist. He saw her on an ocean excursion, but dropped his camera before he could get a picture - now it is his one goal to show he is not crazy and expose Madison for the mermaid she is.

Will Kornbluth expose her? Will this be a deal breaker for Allen? Will Madison be able to last outside of the ocean for so long?

I have to admit, Splash was a pleasant surprise - I hadn't seen it in a long time, but I still enjoyed it. Maybe not as much as I enjoyed it when I was younger, but honestly it still held up for me.

I really enjoyed the relationship between Hanks and Hannah - plus the trio of Hanks, Candy and Levy were great together.

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43/50: Kill Bill, Vol. 2

As I said in yesterday's 'post' I have decided to combine the two Kill Bill films. I know it is technically two movies - but it is more or less one film split into two.

First off, I have to admit, I never much thought of Uma Thurman as one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood. The Poison Ivy part in Batman was supposed to go to the most beautiful woman in Hollywood, and it went to her - but I just didn't see it. Well, despite being covered in blood for most of the films, I can see now what others were thinking - she looked amazing.

So, Thurman stars as the Bride in this revenge-filled film - both Kill Bill, Volume 1 and Kill Bill, Volume 2.

In the first film, we see that the Bride was 'killed' on the night before her wedding - while pregnant. She is found by the local police and taken to the hospital, where she laid in the hospital in a coma for months.

Once she came to, she escapes a nasty orderly and one of Adam Sandler's pals, and claims her revenge upon the people that put her in the hospital.

If my memory serves, during the first film the Bride takes on Vernita Green (Vivica A. Fox) and also O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu).

The first of the two films is much more bloody - the scene where the Bride takes on Ishii is amazing as she fights an entire mob of people before having to take on Ishii herself.

The second film is a little less bloody - and I have to admit I thought it was going somewhere else at the conclusion, but I am so glad it didn't. It would have taken away from everything we were building towards.

In Volume 2, the Bride takes on Budd (Mark Madsen) and Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah) before finally making her way to her primary target, Bill (David Carradine).

Quentin Tarantino has a pretty great way of telling a story without telling it in a straight way. He is all over the place with flashbacks and out of whack placement of parts, but somehow it all comes together - and it works here just as well as in Pulp Fiction.

Like I said, I fell in love with Thurman and her quest to find those who tried to kill her - did kill her fiancé - all while she was pregnant.

The movies weren't perfect - I felt there were some extremely slow scenes that I guess ere needed for the overall effect of the film, but I didn't really enjoy. It took away from the action sequences and her journey. I was not a fan of the slow, somewhat boring scenes between Bill and the Bride (the flashback scenes, not the end sequence). And, I definitely did not enjoy the part (that was really drawn out) between the Bride and Pai Mei (Chia Hui Liu), her training master.

Overall, however, I was thoroughly enjoyed. Not as much as Pulp Fiction, but the story was great and told in an amazing way. And, like I said, so glad they went the way they did for the ending - I would have been totally pissed if they went the other way.

If this were two grades I would probably put the first film higher. I felt it was more action packed and had less slow-down scenes. But, this is an overall grade for the pair of films.

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