Blade Runner

Film Noir’s are notorious for their dark, dreaded, and depressing scenery and themes, while utilizing ones very own agency and memories to mold the framework for the movies. And Blade Runner is seen as one of the poster children of the noir genera because it implements all of these elements within its plot on a regular basis while drawing you into the characters thoughts, in turn fitting the criteria laid out by Pippin in his book Fatalism in American Film Noir. With that being said, in my opinion, Pippin describes the Film Noir’s to be films which evoke a sense of pre-determined doom/ fatalism with questionable agency marked by a mood of pessimism and menace. Thus drawing attention to the characters questionable morals and the temptation between “the good” and “the bad” throughout the films. Within Blade Runner we often see trademark features of the noir genre. For starters a common characteristic of noir’s is the frequent use of narrative through flashbacks. These flash backs often tell the story of the main character or the noir hero and there presumably doomed journeys which they felt were out of their control. We can see an example of such a situation in Out of the Past. Just like in the beginning of Out of the Past when we see the story of Jef Bailey retold for us, Blade Runner begins with Rick Deckard, the Blade Runner, recalling his memories within in interview with his former supervisor. Each flashback establishes the background for the future plot and scenery. At this time, within the two stories being retold to us, we can explicitly see the key similarities noirs share in scenery. The noirs often take place in confined, dark, decrepit, and melodramatic atmospheres. Sebastian’s apartment where Deckard tracks them down near the end gives us all a clear vibe of the hopeless satanic state of those who live there, while the rest of Los Angeles is no longer the sunny fun loving place we know today either. The lack of hope you get while witnessing such scenes truly elevates these films to a new emotional level classifying them as noirs. The idea of a female fatale is also present in numerous noirs. The female fatale is an idea that the male lead is drawn into the trap of the female antagonist. It is well recorded