The Deckard introduction scene uses Mise-en usefully as a way to introduce the world and main character of Blade Runner. Ridley Scott wants the audience to understand clearly the world and characters as he knows as this scene is the best way to further the plot, as for some it will be too complexed to fully get the movie. So by feeding the information through this scene, to whom Deckard’s character and the world he lives in.
Set Design is very important to the scene as this is the audience’s first real look of the streets of this cyberpunk world, so he needed to make an impact. The way he does this is by compacting the scene with many people to show how this is dystopian Los Angeles facing over population but the surprise too many audiences of the 1982 would have been how familiar it looks to a normal street covered with stalls and restaurants. By 1982 futuristic films always used unusual sets such as in Alien with the space ship but this scene is used to create a realistic future unlike the latter what was using sets to create a unrealistic one. So by the use of these stalls and restaurants with an over compact street shows this world as being small scaled. This sets ups the world perfectly as it’s different to anything else what comes before, while achieving verisimilitude what is done by a familiar set but in an unexpected place.
Costume is used in this scene to separate everyone from each other through culture, job and personality as Deckard can be seen in a mixed cultured district and is distinguishable through his bleak brown clothes unlike the others who have colour to their costumes. Culture is shown by the cook wearing traditional Japanese chefs clothing. Personality can be seen by Gaff who looks like he is wearing high end clothing what can show his smug personality. However these characters are wearing normal clothing, so again it’s used to make the audience feel familiar with the setting. Though there are costumes what uses the futuristic setting in their design such as woman on screen for 5 seconds can clearly be seen wearing futuristic goggles. The reluctance of using that many futuristic costumes is likely to not take away focus of the plot by not going over the top.
Space at the beginning is by the focus being on the narrow street until the camera shifts focus on Deckard who becomes the foreground while the neon light background surrounding him to signify him as the protagonist and is important in this story. When Gaff comes up to Deckard, again he is the foreground while Gaff and the other detective are in the background as a way to show them as unimportant. This focus on Deckard is a way to show the audience this is the person you’ll be focusing on.
Lighting is key in this movie as a whole as this movie is presented as bleak to connect to its theme of being in a bleak future. Throughout this film and this scene light is always used in minimal quantities. This is shown by the neon lights and restaurant, even though the part with the restaurant takes up most of the scene, the lighting seems to be off by the use of steam and the dark background when focusing on Deckard by them blocking out the key light hitting the faces of Deckard and Gaff’s. The use of light gives unease as it’s a very unusual feeling you get from the light on the screen. Scott or his team likely came up with this effect to show the themes such as global affects what at that time would cause unease as these weren’t that much of an issue.
Composition is used well by the arrangement of both sound and lighting. This is seen by the narrow street where the sound is foreign music further implies the themes of mixed-culture and overpopulation. The scene also becomes unbalanced by the amount of people walking down the street what shows the same theme. While lighting is presented only being seen on both sides of the street not in the centre head on, this is implying that the only source of light is from artificial light and not natural light showing the theme of global dimming. This affects the audience as this gives more layers of understanding to the world.
Make-up and hair plays a small part in the scene as these can be only be seen on background characters such as the man at the restaurant with green face paint. This is likely done to make those characters more memorable to the audience.
Film stock and aspect ratio plays into the film by being shot in colour. The use of neon colour gives the film its identity of being cyberpunk. The use of colour also makes it more unique viewing for the audience.
