Blade Runner 2049 Director Denis Villeneuve on Seeing the Original for the First Time

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At the time, in the 80's, obviously,

there was no internet.

I mean I was coming from very small town in Quebec.

The news that we got at the time, was from Fanzeen,

you know like Starlogger or Fantastic Films,

and I still vividly remember going to the ...

I don't know, newspaper store?

You know, and having all those magazines,

and seeing Harrison Ford,

I mean Rick Deckard and Gaff in the Spinner, and

I still vividly remember the first time I saw that image,

and the emotion it created inside of me, that excitement

of having the strong impression

that it was something new, that I have never seen before.

That strong emotion was present at the time

when I saw the movie for the first time.

Really the first time that I felt that someone

was bringing me in the future,

showing me what our future could be like,

and how dark it was, but how exciting it could be

at the same time.

It's an experience I will never forget.

[Rick Deckard] The charmer's name was Gaff,

I'd seen him around.

The first one I saw it, I was raised with,

is the original one with the voiceover, et cetera.

That was the movie I embraced at the beginning,

and at the time I was not aware of,

that there really was a frustrate about this version.

I thought that the voiceover gave,

at the time, I felt a kind of film noir element

that felt logic to the mood of the movie,

and I just deeply fell in love with that film.

I still remember the emotion I got

it was written on the screen, 'November, 2019, Los Angeles'

and then the first frame that we were seeing,

that first landscape that,

as an audience, we're allowed to see.

It was a very impressive experience,

to see that movie on the big screen for the first time.

It was the birth of VHS, the birth of a ...

And so later on, it was one of the first one I got.

For the first time I was the owner of a film,

that was an experience that was not ...

It was like a book you could watch

over and over and over again.

So I totally destroyed the tape...

I mean I watch it so many times.

The first time I saw it what distracts me was the really ...

To have the impression

that I was in a time traveling machine,

that I was embracing the future,

and as scary as that vision was, impressive it was,

I had strong impression

that I was witnessing something I was not allowed to see

which was the future.

It was like a presence, you felt it was coming.

You felt that what they showed us, was in some ways ...

You feel it from your intuitional segue,

that's gonna look like that,

that's where we are going.

It was like the first time that that strong impression,

that it was a visionary experience.

I'm not surprised that the world is just

catching up towards Blade Runner more and more,

for the best and the worst.

(laughs)

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