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Vader
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 Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2011 5:13 am Post subject: |
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| andy wrote: | | I also have a feeling that Zhora may have aleady had experience doing this kind of thing. Maybe as a part of her role as an undercover hit woman. Mata Hari anyone? |
Ooh, very good! That is brilliant. (in a David Tennant voice)
That's the piece I was missing! Couple this with what Art and andy had said earlier...
| Art Deckard wrote: | | ...working as an erotic dancer in a sleazy joint like the Snake Pit is an obvious choice for a physically attractive female rep who wants to get hired quick, ... and earn decent money... |
...and we have a plausible explanation that makes it worth the hassle, risk and expense to take the job: it's good money, she's got experience doing it - and it is threrefore also familiar. Zhora's developing emotional responses must be drawn to the security of that which is familiar.
That fits brilliantly!
So, why does she have a go at Deckard?
Now, re. the snake (veering a bit OT, but I feel this needs to be straightened out).
| Art Deckard wrote: | Besides Snakes DO have scales, just not ones that shed individually. I watched the dissection of a python on TV recently and the snake expert referred to them as 'scales' and pulled an individual one away from the skin. ...
EDIT: A quick trawl through some Snake forums suggests that illness is the underlying cause of scale shedding. That or humidity. |
Weeell... having had snakes myself for several years and having read up on them quite thoroughly in the meanwhile, I feel can say with some authority that while snakes do have something called "scales" over their surface, these are not designed anything even remotely resembling that of how the things called "scales" on e.g. fish are designed, except in the most superficial outward appearance.
Fish scales are like the feathers on a bird. You can drop one, and it really makes no difference. A new one will grow to take its place.
Snake scales are not. The "scales" are, like andy noted earlier, merely a pattern of tiny folds in the skin; larger on the ventral surfaces. Take one off, and you make a hole in the skin, with blood coming out!
Snakes can suffer from a variety of conditions (from dry skin to fungus) causing what appears to be individual scales shedding off, but (a) it's really just the outer layers of skin on a scale dropping off, not the scale itself, and (b) the result looks nothing like what Deckard finds in the bathtub!
Which brings us back to the story:
I doubt Ben Hassan's snakes are shoddy workmanship - the lady at the microscope indicates the exact opposite. So, why has the snake scales?
And yes, shoddy scriptwriting is a plausible (albeit boring) explanation, but as I noted earlier, it would have been almost impossible for them not to catch the mistake once shooting started, and it would have been very easy for them to correct it on the spot - and actually gain a bit in visual interest in the process.
Yet they choose not to.
So, is it just sloppiness bordering on the criminal (not otherwise a defining characteristic of the BR production), or is there an interesting thought behind it?
And even if there isn't - can we invent one?
I don't recall that it's explicitly spelled out that Taffy Lewis himself bought the snake from Abdul Ben Hassan. The meaning might also be that Ben Hassan is where Taffy sends people that work for him to buy their snakes, because he expects a certain quality, or look, or whatever.
Either way, it makes little difference, I suppose - the one thing that is clear is that one way or another, Zhora is paying for hers.
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joberg
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2011 8:04 am Post subject: |
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Well, if Pris was to recon JF and his digs, as to make it ''safe'' for Batty and him having access to Tyrell, and let's just say that Pris would've been discovered as a Replicant and killed, don't you think that it would've been a logistical nightmare not to have another female Replicant to take over? You guys might be right after all: Zhora has done the job before, she's use to it...maybe Batty is playing chess again: keeping his best piece in case of emergency.
(if Zhora wasn't interrupted in her fight with Deckard, maybe she would've had killed right then and there...by doing so blowing her cover. Or she didn't even tried hard, maybe teaching that creep a lesson).
Now to come back to the first idea of Pris being eliminated:
that job would've fallen now on Zhora: ''contact that JF Sebastian p.d.q. and get me access to my maker''.
As for the ''scale''oversight, I think it's a genuine mistake from production; unless you know that snake don't have the same kind of scale as a fish...my 2 cents. |
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TimeEnough
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2011 6:26 pm Post subject: |
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Real quick, couldn't the nasty face Pris gives Sabastion be aimed at all humans? Then again, this scene comes almost directly after Chew, so my theory is on ice. She's quite the actress.
A side question I was wondering which is better: the non narrated or narrated version of BR? I only own the non narrated. Should I invest in the other version? |
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Vader
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2011 6:40 pm Post subject: |
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Simple answer, IMHO: yes.
They are very different. The voice over really enhances the Film Noir feel of the piece, and ... well, they add a lot to the viewing experience. Not having them is a good thing, too, in a different way, but I'd really advice experiencing BR both ways.
And once you've done it, I very much look forward to hearing the POV of someone who experienced it the other way around: non-voice over version before the one with...
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Last edited by Vader on Fri Mar 11, 2011 2:44 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Art Deckard
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2011 8:49 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah, I read about the difference between fish and snake scales when this issue first arose some years back. I was suggesting that there was enough superficial similarity to get past this with a bit of hand-waving.
This whole story element first arose quite late on in the films development when someone suggested to Ridley that we need to see Deckard do some detecting. He didn't necessarily agree but found himself needing a clue. Although the Animoid row stuff was obviously filmed during principle photohraphy the bathroom scene was, I think, the last shot they made for BR as a pick-up in the UK much later (It's Fords double we see tapping the strip light and bagging the clue). So I think it's easy to see how this could have got through without anybody noticing. I certainly didn't notice until it was pointed out.
As for positing an in world explanation, beyond replicant snake skin being different to real snake skin or the snake being sick (which you have discounted) I have to say I'm out of ideas. 
Last edited by Art Deckard on Thu Mar 10, 2011 10:12 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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Art Deckard
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| Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2011 9:06 pm Post subject: |
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| The Loyalizer wrote: | | Art Deckard wrote: | | The Loyalizer wrote: | | Watch Holden's reaction when Leon says he's never seen a tortoise but knows what he means. Holden knows right there he's got a replicant. |
| vader wrote: | | I agree completely. It is obvious from the look Holden gives Leon, and from the triumphant tone in his voice when he starts pressuring Leon about the turtle. |
There's even a quick shot of the VK suggesting that maybe Holden has spotted something on the monitor. |
Doesn't the VK machine make a beeping noise right before Holden looks up at Leon when that question comes up? Or is that just background noise in the Tyrell building? |
Missed this, Loyalizer. It does indeed. |
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The Loyalizer
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2011 5:46 am Post subject: |
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| TimeEnough wrote: | Real quick, couldn't the nasty face Pris gives Sabastion be aimed at all humans? Then again, this scene comes almost directly after Chew, so my theory is on ice. She's quite the actress.
A side question I was wondering which is better: the non narrated or narrated version of BR? I only own the non narrated. Should I invest in the other version? |
While the voice over is badly done, it is how 90% of us got to see the film in the first place. Like others have said both have their place/merit.
From my own experience, I remember going to see the 92 Director's Cut, unaware at the time that the voice over had been removed. I went because I'd been too young to see it on the big screen when it first came out. What I remember was how much faster the Directors Cut seemed to pace compared to the voice over.
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joberg
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2011 7:56 am Post subject: |
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| Both versions have their own merit and I think it's a good idea to view them both...same concept as a painting: I like to see the idea being developed by the artist, the first pencilled forms...that can be very different than the finished product... |
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Vader
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| Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2011 2:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Art Deckard wrote: | | As for positing an in world explanation, beyond replicant snake skin being different to real snake skin ... I have to say I'm out of ideas. |
Yeah, that seems to be where we're ending up, more or less.
The question then becomes: how far are we willing to go, following the on-screen "canon"?
If we feel it is sufficient to note that shoddiness did indeed creep even into the production of BR, and if we feel it would seem overly contrived to read much significance into story elements that have arisen out of such sloppiness — even if they upon closer examination might merit it — then that will perforce be the end of it.
On the other hand, if we feel we are best satisfied by trying to make the world of BR as internally consistent as we can, and find logical explanations for even those things that only arise from the occasional carelessness of the filmmakers themselves ... then we probably ought to follow this line of reasoning a bit further:
So — replicated snake skin is different from real snake skin. And not only that, it is fundamentally different, on the level of fulfilling an entirely different function, in terms of the biology of the organism.
Or rather one should say, what we know is that Ben Hassan has at least one line of snakes in his portfolio that differs thus from real snakes. It does not necessarily follow that this is true of all replicated snakes.
- It might for instance be possible that this something that Ben Hassan offers as a designer feature — that having a snake that sheds scales all over a dancer during a show, as Zhora's obviously does, makes for an alluring effect.
- On the other hand, it might also be true of all replicated snakes, at least below a certain price point (Ben Hassan does good work, but is probably not on par with whoever made Tyrell's owl). It might be a design "short cut".
In that case, what are the implications of these, and other, possibilities on human replication?
- If it is a novelty, then it ought to be possible to make "designer replicants" with significantly different biological features from real humans — e.g. a "Neko Musume", a cat girl, with functional cat ears and a tail. Or a "furry", with the above, plus real fur and whiskers. Whatever there is a market for.
- If it is a necessary short cut, are there any complexities in the human physiology that necessitate similar short cuts? If so, which might these be?
Can we find evidence to support either of these theories — or implications of other possible rationales to the snake difference — in the movie?
So ... contrived or not, as you can see, I find it a fascinating mental exercise (not to mention, immensely entertaining) to try to find meaningful in-world explanations even to what obviously are production oversights, and then try to follow the logical implications into the rest of the story!
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The Loyalizer
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| Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2011 6:37 pm Post subject: |
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I've always thought of the artificial animal market as being not unlike the props market. In that you have some very expensive, very high end manufacturers, and then you have independents who's product is visually of the same quality, but different design techniques and materials were utilized.
So who knows? maybe Hassan had some left over fish DNA and spliced that into the snake to cut a corner and the result was mutation.
Ultimately the snake scale is a breadcrumb to lead Deckard to Hassan who tells him about Taffey Lewis. Its actually the sequins he finds in the tub that lets him expose Zhora, because in her dressing room he plucks a sequin off a dress, not a scale off the snake.
Ridley also reused the sequin motif in Black Rain if memory serves.
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Art Deckard
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| Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2011 6:52 pm Post subject: |
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| The Loyalizer wrote: | Its actually the sequins he finds in the tub that lets him expose Zhora, because in her dressing room he plucks a sequin off a dress, not a scale off the snake.
Ridley also reused the sequin motif in Black Rain if memory serves. |
He did, yeah. In fact I think it's on the Black Rain commentary that Ridley says they needed a clue, quick, so they just reused the BR idea.
There's a lot of parallels between Blade Runner and Black Rain. Worth a look if any fans haven't seen it. |
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Art Deckard
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| Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2011 7:08 pm Post subject: |
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| The Loyalizer wrote: | . Its actually the sequins he finds in the tub that lets him expose Zhora, because in her dressing room he plucks a sequin off a dress, not a scale off the snake.
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This has always been a source of confusion for me. He reaches into the bath and picks something up with his finger. We see him bag it and it's the 'snake scale' he later hands to the Cambodian lady in the same bag.
With the sequin he finds in Zhora's dressing room, is it not just that it ties in with the sequins viewed in Leon's photo whilst using the Esper?
The final confirmation is the snake tattoo we see when she's lying dead on the floor (also viewed in the 'hard copy' generated by the Esper) |
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Art Deckard
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| Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2011 7:38 pm Post subject: |
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| TimeEnough wrote: |
A side question I was wondering which is better: the non narrated or narrated version of BR? I only own the non narrated. Should I invest in the other version? |
There is no better only your own preference. I prefer the dialogue free version. An interesting point made a few years back (by Paul M sammon I think) Is that when the Directors Cut was released, people like me saw it having already had a lot of the films story explained by the voice of Deckard in the original cut. We took that information to the cinema when the DC came out (even though some of it doesn't hold up that well). As much as I'd like to think BR would have made perfect sense to me without that info, I can't ever know for sure. I was 14 when I saw BR on it's first release so the finer points may have sailed over my head were it not for 'Irving the Explainer'. Some of those lines became very quotable. |
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Vader
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| Posted: Mon Mar 14, 2011 8:11 am Post subject: |
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| Art Deckard wrote: | | The Loyalizer wrote: | . Its actually the sequins he finds in the tub that lets him expose Zhora, because in her dressing room he plucks a sequin off a dress, not a scale off the snake.
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He reaches into the bath and picks something up with his finger. We see him bag it and it's the 'snake scale' he later hands to the Cambodian lady in the same bag. |
Quite. I, too, have always understood the object that Deckard finds in the bathtub to be the "snake scale" that leads him to Ben Hassan, and hence to Taffy Lewis, and hence to "Salome", and thus allows him to expose Zhora.
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andy
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| Posted: Mon Mar 14, 2011 1:38 pm Post subject: |
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He sees the sequins in Leon's photo that he used the Esper on. They were in the closet near where he spies Zhora with the snake tattoo. He later only confirms the same style of dress and sequins in her dressing room.
Andy |
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Art Deckard
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2011 8:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Art Deckard wrote: | | TimeEnough wrote: | | Right, I know he was speaking about Voight-Kampff machine, but he's speaking about something that happened badly in the past (look at Bryant's expression afterward). |
Welcome, TimeEnough.
And if the machine doesn't work?
To me, Bryant's look in response is basically 'well then we're up shit creek without a paddle'. |
Haha!
Was just reading an early draft of the BR script from 1980, for the first time, and I came across this line:
BRYANT
The Tyrell Corporation has a
demo model. Check it out on the
Voight-Kampff. There's a chance
the Nexus-6 is beyond out ability
to detect. If that's the case,
everybody's up shit creek.
M. Emmett Walsh. Superb acting chops.  |
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Dorian Gray
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2011 9:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Are you a Replican or a Replicant? |
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andy
Community Guide
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2011 9:50 pm Post subject: |
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| Dorian Gray wrote: | | Are you a Replican or a Replicant? |
It is "...Replican't or a Replican" I used to say this one all the time 
Andy |
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Dorian Gray
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2011 10:02 pm Post subject: |
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| thought I was being clever while washing my hair in the the shower yesterday. Meh. |
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SCOFFMAN
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| Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2011 11:12 pm Post subject: |
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| joberg wrote: | I'm not so sure about Leon and Holden's interview...I think that at the end of the interview Holden knows...hence the image of him holding his gun and crashing into the desk...it was a simple western scene: who was the fastest shooter. It takes longer to detect Rachael...but she's detected at the end of the excercice also. The V.K. works, albeit slowly than before, with the new models. Maybe it's all a game between RepDetect and Replicant: as a Replicant I think that I have a lot of infos on how to be human...as a RepDetect I have a lot of questions (and the V.K. for confirmation) to catch the Replicant.
It reminds me of that scheme the Germans tried during the battle of the Bulge: recruiting German soldiers that had lived in the U.S. (either for school or others) and dress them as U.S. soldiers to infiltrate and wreak havoc on the inside! They were discovered when U.S. soldiers started to ask them seemingly inocuous questions about baseball teams or mixing on purpose the name of known baseball players (like Babe Ruth playing for the Phillies  )... |
Did you know that when the US forces discovered the Germans that were posing as US soldiers we had them shot as spies? I didn't know about that until recently myself until I saw a documentary on the Military channel about the Battle of the Bulge, but it's true...they showed the actual footage of the executions. It was rather disturbing, but it happened.
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