Visionary director Denis Villeneuve would love to revisit the rainy, neon-lit future world of ‘Blade Runner 2049’. Villeneuve delivered his striking sequel in 2017, but despite being critically acclaimed, the film did not win over audiences, perhaps because it was the follow-up to Ridley Scott’s movie from 1982 which was not a hit, but a cult favorite.
But despite the lack of financial success for ‘2049’, it remains a highly regarded picture and Empire selected it as #45 on its list of 100 Greatest Movies Of The Century issue. The director discussed his film and expressed a desire to revisit this reality, but in a manner that doesn’t necessarily carry on the storyline of Harrison Ford’s Rick Deckard or Ryan Gossling’s ‘K’.
The original ‘Blade Runner’ was based on Philip K. Dick’s novel ‘Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?’, and as it turns out, Villeneuve dreams of androids, as he revealed that thinking about a new original movie set in the ‘Blade Runner’ universe sometimes keeps him up at nights!
“It’s such an inspiring place, the Blade Runner world. The problem I have is the word ‘sequel’. I think cinema needs original stories. But if you ask me if I’d like to revisit this universe in a different way, I can say yes. It would need to be a project on its own. Something disconnected from both other movies. A detective noir story set in the future… I wake up sometimes in the night dreaming about it.”
Villeneuve is currently in the process of crafting a follow-up to another ’80s sci-fi milestone, ‘Dune’, also for Warner Brothers, the studio behind ‘Blade Runner 2049’. David Lynch directed an adaptation in 1984, which, like ‘Blade Runner’ was a flop at the box office, but has attracted a cult following over the years. Both versions are based on the novel by Frank Herbert, but Villeneuve is splitting the novel into at least two movies, whereas Lynch attempted to cram it all into one 136-minute installment, which may have hurt it initially.
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Perhaps if ‘Dune’ does very well (and that’s a big “if”), Warner Brothers would be willing to bankroll another ‘Blade Runner’-inspired movie by Villeneuve… so long as it’s very clear to the public that it is not another sequel.
‘Dune’ stars Timothée Chalamet as Paul Atreides, Javier Bardem as Stilgar, Dave Bautista as Glossu ‘Beast’ Rabban, Josh Brolin as Gurney Halleck, David Dastmalchian as Piter De Vries, Rebecca Ferguson as Lady Jessica, Stephen McKinley Henderson as Thufir Hawat, Oscar Isaac as Duke Leto Atreides, Jason Momoa as Duncan Idaho, Charlotte Rampling as Reverend Mother Mohiam, Stellan Skarsgård as Baron Harkonnen, and Zendaya as Chani. It opens on December 18, 2020.
Would you like to see another film in that setting from Villeneuve?
