Saturday, 27 March 2010

Ridley & Tony Scott's new Blade Runner?

This week we have heard two pieces of Blade Runner news that may be related. Let's start with the most recent "flash".

A few weeks ago Henry Jenkins (a Professor of Communication, Journalism, and Cinematic Arts as well as all round Convergence Culture player) sat down with with Steven Lisberger (director of the original Tron) to discuss Tron; its social relevance of, his experience of making Tron and how Tron: Legacy fits.

The discussion is currently made up of 9 clips, with more to come. In the first clip, in reference to people connecting with ground breaking Sci Fi from a certain period - Henry Jenkins says at around 4:22 :
with the Scott Brothers returning to Blade Runner, with a new project right now which is roughly the same vintage.




The full post and interview clips can be seen over here on Henry Jenkins website. It's insightful a well worth a browse.

We suspect that Jenkins is referring to "Purefold" a web series to be developed by Ag8, Ridley and Tony Scott’s RSA Films and Baby Cow Productions. The series was to consist of five- to 10-minute webisodes set shortly before 2019, when Blade Runner took place and aimed initially at the Web moving to television.

Which brings me to the second news flash this week , yesterday we were given the heads up that the Purefold project had been cancelled! You can read the full statement on the Ag8 website here.

We still live in hope of Blade Runner being revisited.

Update #1: 29 March
After a bit of digging we found a video presentation from Ag8 that pitches/explains Purefold, the people involved and touches on how it is related to Blade Runner. Wow! It really was an ambitious project that seems a little ahead of its time. I'm hoping that it's reincarnated at some point.

b.TWEEN 09 - Ag8 talk about Purefold from info btween on Vimeo.



Ridley & Tony Scott's new Blade Runner?

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