50 Fun Facts About Blade Runner

Who directed the 1982 film Blade Runner?

Ridley Scott signed on after leaving a slow-moving Dune adaptation, wanting faster work to take his mind off the death of his brother Frank.

Who plays Rick Deckard in Blade Runner?

Harrison Ford called the shoot a long slog and clashed with his director, yet he came back to play Deckard again 35 years later in Blade Runner 2049.

Which Philip K. Dick novel was adapted into Blade Runner?

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? appeared in 1968; Philip K. Dick died months before the film opened, but he had been shown a reel of its effects and said the world looked exactly as he had imagined it.

Which Tesla debuted in Los Angeles in November 2019, Blade Runner's setting?

Cybertruck: Musk had promised a pickup that looked like something out of Blade Runner, and at the launch its supposedly unbreakable windows shattered when a metal ball was thrown at them.

Which effects pioneer of 2001: A Space Odyssey supervised Blade Runner's special effects with Richard Yuricich?

Douglas Trumbull set the effects up knowing he would leave about halfway through to direct his own film, Brainstorm, so David Dryer stepped in to see them finished.

Which corporation manufactures the replicants in the original 1982 Blade Runner?

Tyrell Corporation sells them under the motto 'More human than human'; its towering headquarters was a miniature whose shots were lined up using stills from Fritz Lang's Metropolis.

In Blade Runner, what slur does police captain Bryant use for replicants?

Skin-jobs is Bryant's word for the fugitives he orders Deckard to hunt, and the same slur resurfaced decades later in the reimagined Battlestar Galactica for its human-looking Cylons.

In Blade Runner, which test is used to tell replicants from humans?

The Voight-Kampff test tracks blush response, heart rate and eye movement during questions meant to provoke empathy; on Rachael it takes far longer than usual, because she believes she is human.

In Blade Runner's opening scene, which replicant shoots the blade runner Holden during his test?

Leon answers a question about his mother with 'Let me tell you about my mother' and fires, which is why Deckard is hauled back from retirement to finish Holden's job.

Which replicant model are the fugitives Deckard is sent to retire in Blade Runner?

Nexus-6 is the model in both the film and the novel; when Google named an Android phone the Nexus One in 2010, Philip K. Dick's estate objected that the name traded on his androids.

How long is the built-in lifespan of the replicants hunted in Blade Runner?

Four years is all they get: their makers feared replicants would develop emotions of their own over time, so an early death was designed in.

In Blade Runner, whose memories were implanted in Rachael to give her an 'emotional cushion'?

Tyrell's niece supplied the memories: when Rachael brings Deckard a family photo to prove she is human, he tells her where her childhood really came from, and she leaves in tears.

Who plays the replicant Rachael in Blade Runner?

Sean Young, then little known, won the part after several screen tests; screenwriter Hampton Fancher had written Rachael for his girlfriend of the time, Barbara Hershey.

Which actress plays the replicant Pris in Blade Runner?

Daryl Hannah performed some of Pris's gymnastic stunts herself, in a role that Debbie Harry of Blondie had turned down.

Which actor plays Gaff, the detective who brings Deckard in at the start of Blade Runner?

Edward James Olmos came back to the part 35 years later for a single scene in Blade Runner 2049, in which the hero questions an aged Gaff in a retirement home.

In Blade Runner, what is the 'Cityspeak' that Gaff talks?

A street patois of several languages, 'gutter talk' mixing Japanese, Spanish and German: Deckard knows the lingo perfectly well but pretends he needs it translated, just to make Gaff's job harder.

In Blade Runner, what clue from a replicant's hotel room leads Deckard to Zhora?

A synthetic snake scale leads Deckard to Taffey Lewis's club, where Zhora performs with an artificial snake; she flees through the crowded streets before he shoots her.

In Blade Runner, what is the job of J. F. Sebastian, who shelters Pris and Roy?

Genetic designer for the replicants' maker: Sebastian's own Methuselah syndrome ages him too fast, so he looks far older than he is and shares his creations' short life.

In Blade Runner, how does Roy Batty kill his maker in the penthouse scene?

He crushes his eyes and skull, moments after kissing him: Roy had come to demand more life, and his maker had told him it could not be done.

What does Deckard find on the floor as he leaves with Rachael at the end of Blade Runner?

An origami unicorn, left by Gaff: in later cuts Deckard daydreams of a unicorn, so the paper figure hints that Gaff knows his private thoughts, as if they were implants.

Which Blade Runner actor rewrote his 'tears in rain' speech the night before filming it?

Rutger Hauer thought the scripted speech was 'opera talk', so the night before he cut most of it and added the closing image of moments lost like tears in rain, without telling the director.

In Blade Runner's 'tears in rain' speech, attack ships burn off whose shoulder?

Orion: the whole speech runs to just 42 words, because the actor delivering it cut swathes from the scripted version and added the closing line himself.

In Blade Runner's 'tears in rain' speech, C-beams glitter in the dark near which place?

The Tannhäuser Gate is never explained in the film, which has not stopped later science-fiction stories from borrowing the name as a nod to the speech.

Which composer wrote Blade Runner's synthesizer score?

Vangelis improvised it at his London studio while watching tapes of the film, yet his own recordings were not released as an album until 1994, twelve years later.

Which actor did screenwriter Hampton Fancher have in mind when writing Deckard's dialogue for Blade Runner?

Robert Mitchum was the Deckard in Fancher's head; the filmmakers courted Dustin Hoffman instead, but the talks dragged and the two sides parted ways before the part was finally cast.

Blade Runner took its title from a film treatment by which Beat Generation writer?

William S. Burroughs wrote 'Blade Runner (a movie)' as a treatment of Alan Nourse's novel about smugglers of medical supplies; the filmmakers liked the name and bought the rights, taking nothing else from either.

Which downtown Los Angeles landmark played J. F. Sebastian's home in Blade Runner?

The Bradbury Building was nearly 90 years old when it played a home of the future: the 1893 office block also stages the film's climax, while Union Station plays the police station.

What are the flying police cars in Blade Runner called?

Spinners lift straight off the ground, hover and cruise like jump jets, and the design proved so influential that a repainted one sits parked on a street in Back to the Future Part II.

Which artist was hired as concept designer for Blade Runner's futuristic look?

Syd Mead was first asked only for Deckard's car, but he kept drawing the streets and buildings around it until he had designed the city, then invented the credit 'visual futurist' for himself.

Which Edward Hopper painting was a model for the mood of Blade Runner?

Nighthawks: the director said he was constantly waving a reproduction of the painting under the noses of his production team to show the look and mood he was after.

The aerial landscape shots in Blade Runner's theatrical happy ending were surplus footage from which film?

Stanley Kubrick's The Shining supplied them: when the studio imposed a happy ending, the director asked Kubrick, who lent unused helicopter footage shot for his film's opening.

In the 'T-shirt war' on the Blade Runner set, what did the American crew's mocking shirts say?

Yes Guv'nor, My Ass mocked the British director's remark that he preferred crews back home; he hit back with a shirt of his own that read 'Xenophobia Sucks'.

Which of these was added to Blade Runner's US theatrical cut after poor test screenings?

A voice-over narration was written in by the financiers after test audiences struggled to follow the story; the film's star fought it and later called it simply bad narration.

What did a later Blade Runner cut hide in Zhora's death scene?

The stuntwoman who crashed through the glass in 1982 was plainly not the actress; 25 years on, Joanna Cassidy was filmed again so her face could be laid over the double's.

Packed screenings of which Blade Runner version led Warner Bros. to commission the 1992 Director's Cut?

The workprint resurfaced in 1989, when a forgotten 70 mm print was found by chance; its cinema showings then drew queues round the block, and the studio approved an official new cut.

Which big film opened close to Blade Runner in June 1982 and is blamed for hurting its box office?

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial was already filling cinemas when Blade Runner opened in second place with $6.1 million; John Carpenter's The Thing came out the same day and fared worse.

Producer Alan Ladd Jr. gave Blade Runner a 'lucky' 25th release date after Alien and which other hit of his?

Star Wars and Alien had both opened on a May 25 while Ladd ran 20th Century Fox, so he booked June 25 for Blade Runner; this time the charm failed, and it opened only in second place.

Which defunct airline is advertised on Blade Runner's 2019 skyline, fuelling talk of a 'Blade Runner curse'?

Pan Am went bankrupt in 1991, nine years after its logo lit up the film; Atari, Bell and RCA, also on its billboards, hit trouble too, which fans dubbed the curse.

Unlike Blade Runner's Los Angeles, where is Philip K. Dick's novel set?

San Francisco after a nuclear war, with many survivors gone to off-world colonies, is where the book's Deckard works as a police bounty hunter chasing six escaped androids.

In the Philip K. Dick novel that became Blade Runner, which company makes the androids?

The Rosen Association is based in Seattle; when Deckard arrives to check his empathy test on its newest model, the firm nearly tricks him into believing the test has failed.

In the Philip K. Dick novel behind Blade Runner, which live animal does Deckard buy with his bounty money?

A Nubian goat is his prize, because most species are extinct and owning a real animal is the book's great status symbol; the android Rachael later kills it.

Who directed Blade Runner 2049?

Denis Villeneuve took over after the original film's director, committed to Alien: Covenant, stepped back to executive-produce and help shape the script.

Which actor plays K, the replicant blade runner at the centre of Blade Runner 2049?

Ryan Gosling had the part written for him: the screenwriters tailored K to the actor, who had never before led a blockbuster production.

Who plays Joi, K's holographic girlfriend, in Blade Runner 2049?

Ana de Armas arrived in Los Angeles speaking very little English and spent four months studying it full-time before she auditioned for the part that made her name.

Which musician was considered for Niander Wallace in Blade Runner 2049 but died months before filming began?

David Bowie, a core influence on the whole franchise, died in January 2016; the filmmakers then cast Jared Leto, who they felt had the same rock-star presence.

In which city was most of Blade Runner 2049 shot?

Budapest: the makers chose early on to build real sets instead of leaning on digital effects, and built them at Origo Studios on the city's edge and Korda Studios just to its west.

Which cinematographer won the Oscar for Blade Runner 2049?

Roger Deakins had been nominated 13 times without winning, so Blade Runner 2049 finally brought him his first Oscar at the 14th attempt.

Where does K finally track down Deckard in Blade Runner 2049?

A radioactive Las Vegas, long abandoned, is where Deckard has been hiding; K gets there by having a wooden toy horse analysed for traces that show where it was made.

Which composers replaced Jóhann Jóhannsson on Blade Runner 2049?

Hans Zimmer and Benjamin Wallfisch came in late because the director wanted a sound closer to the first film's score, and they built theirs around the same model of synthesizer its composer had used.

Which Hong Kong film mogul helped finance Blade Runner after Filmways pulled its backing?

Run Run Shaw, the Hong Kong studio boss, joined the Ladd Company and Tandem Productions in a three-way deal that producer Michael Deeley stitched together in ten days.