Oscar Profile: Blade Runner 2049

Blade Runner 2049
Warner Bros. – 10/6
Dir: Denis Villeneuve
Cast: Ryan Gosling, Harrison Ford, Robin Wright, Jared Leto, Mackenzie Davis, Ana de Armas

What It’s About: Thirty years after the events of the first film, a new blade runner, LAPD Officer K (Ryan Gosling), unearths a long-buried secret that has the potential to plunge what’s left of society into chaos. K’s discovery leads him on a quest to find Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), a former LAPD blade runner who has been missing for 30 years.

Pros: Well loved source material, high level of anticipation, a cast and crew with dozens of Oscar nominations and a few wins. Director Denis Villeneuve just broke through big time with Arrival last year, which earned 8 Oscar nominations including one for himself as Best Director.

Cons: The original didn’t blow the doors off at the Oscars, it was only nominated for Art Direction and Special Visual Effects.

Bottom Line: The film could be a huge hit. The decision by Warner Bros to release the film in the fall seems to be a shrewd one, to give it some distance from what could be their other big blockbuster, Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, which opens on July 21. The film would probably need to be a critical and box office hit to be honestly given a realistic awards run and it’s in the tech guilds that it will do that. Art Direction, Costumes and obviously Cinematography will put the film in major contention. Could this be the film that finally get Roger Deakins a win?