Blade Runner and The Act of Seeing

The motif of the eye, and the importance of seeing, recurs throughout Blade Runner.  From the opening shot of the future city reflected in the eye, to the Voight-Kampff machine, to Roy's final speech of a life experienced through the act of seeing, the gaze and the eye are everywhere. 

Even Dr Tyrell's glasses are huge and distorting- the creator has exaggerated eyes and the creations- the Replicants- can be determined as non-human through the reactions of their eyes.

When Roy finally destroys his creator (with shades of Frankenstein,Freud and Nietzsche- creator, father, God), he pushes his thumbs through Tyrell's eyes, the same method we see foreshadowed when Leon attacks Deckard. 

Rachel's outward appearance alters once she and Deckard sleep together. From the icily beautiful to a very human natural unconstructed look, her appearance is the signifier of her humanity. The icily beautiful a signifier of her perceived humanity, the unconstructed natural appearance a signifier of her newly found humanity.


See The Eyes Tell All A What, Where, Why Commentary of the Bladerunner Theme John McCoy