Review of Blade Runner 2049 (2017) by Yusef V — 08 Oct 2017

Blade Runner 2049 is directed by Denis Villeneuve, and it stars Ryan Gosling, Harrison Ford, Ana de Armas, Sylvia Hoeks, Robin Wright, and Jared Leto in a science fiction about a Blade Runner name Joe (Ryan Gosling) that is trying to find Deckard (Harrison Ford) so that he can get some questions answered, but then a bunch of people are coming after them for the same questions.

When a sequel for Blade Runner was announced, everybody wasn't pleased with it as the first one is a classic enough as it is, but I was curious about it because Denis Villeneuve is the director of this film, and I've enjoyed a lot of his films so far, and it even has one of the original writers for the first Blade Runner name Hampton Fancher.

So with this being one of the most anticipated films of 2017 for me, I wanted to see this in IMAX, but since my friend, who also enjoyed the first one, didn't have much money to see it, we went to see it in regular theaters, and we have the same thought that we actually love it, while my other friend who has never seen Blade Runner, was pretty indifferent to the sequel.

The acting is fantastic, whether it be from Ryan Gosling as he fit his character of what he is, while also acting intimidating when he's playing it a bit monotonous. Harrison Ford is at his best here as he's also intimidating, but he also have some emotional moments when he had to deal with the events from the first one, which this is one of his bests in recent years.

Robin Wright is great in it which I'm glad to see her getting some movie work, and Ana de Armas was a surprise as she was in Knock Knock, which she was terrible in that, and she's really convincing here as Ryan Gosling's girlfriend.

Sylvia Hoeks is intimidating to the point of being terrifying, and Jared Leto did a lot better here of being weird than he did in Suicide Squad. The story is really good that expanded on the world that is created here, and the writing by Hampton Fancher and Michael Green really seem to understand what make the first one so successful with fans and critics.

For those who have pacing issues with the first one for being way too slow, the pacing in this is faster than the first one, but not by much as this is still slow, and it's more than 2 and a half hours long, so I wouldn't know if some people would get through this.

The story is interesting enough that I never find this movie to be boring, and while this is really long, there's never a scene that was unnecessary or dragged on. The characters are three-dimensional enough that you understand their motivations that they have, and they're smart that I wasn't quite sure where it's going.

The effects and the cinematography by Roger Deakins is the highlight of the film because the effects are the best that I've seen in recent years whether they put in computer, practical and production design effects, it's really impressive how much they took their time, and it definitely felt like it made a new world out of this, while the world looks like it's from the first Blade Runner.

Roger Deakins did a fantastic job of making almost every shot look like effort here, and it makes the movie look grand in scale, which would make me irritated if he doesn't get an Oscar for this. While the marketing for this make it seem like this is going to be an action film, and that's not necessarily the case here as this is more of a dystopian science fiction mystery here just like the first one.

There are some action scenes that are entertaining to watch, that's not the focus of this film. Even though Harrison Ford isn't in this that much as it focuses the most of Ryan Gosling, the first meeting between Ryan Gosling and Harrison Ford is probably the best Sci-Fi moments because the way it's set up is very inventive, and the songs that have a purpose here really work that it can be use as a horror set piece for that scene.

Speaking of songs, the score by Hans Zimmer and Benjamin Wallfisch is great that makes this sound like an epic. Doing a sequel to Blade Runner that's as good or better may seem impossible, but Denis Villeneuve, Hampton Fancher, Michael Green, and Roger Deakins achieve the impossible as Blade Runner 2049 for me is better than the original, is either the best sequel since Terminator 2: Judgement Day, or it's one of the best sequels that I've seen, and I'm looking forward to seeing Denis Villeneuve's version of Dune when it gets created.