Blade Runner - Censorship/Violence Compared

A quick comparison of the various levels of censorship & editing of violent scenes from the 1982 science fiction film Blade Runner.

The Workprint of the film is unique in that it presents two scenes fully uncut that have never been presented as such elsewhere: The sight of a smoking gunshot wound on Holden's back during the opening sequence, and it contains both the third blow and the nose-pull when Pris attacks Deckard towards the end of the movie. It contains the initial gush of blood during the eye-gouging scene, as well as the (here slightly shortened) close-up of Batty removing his thumbs from Tyrell's eyes, but does not include the additional close-ups of blood pouring from the International and Final cuts.

The US theatrical cut and 1992 Director's Cut have numerous cuts for violence made to them, and the editing of the violent content is generally the smoothest in this cut compared to the other non-workprint cuts. The close-up of Holden's smoking wound is removed here, never to be seen again in any further cuts of the film, and the eye-gouging is completely off-screen, with an extended shots of Batty and an additional shot of an owl covering for the moments where the actual violent shots would have been. All three blows from Pris remain intact, but her pulling Deckard's nose has been removed.

The International Cut of the film suffers from less censorship than the US cut, and has some entirely new shots to it as well, but a lot of it is edited very awkwardly. The eye-gouging scene seems to flow best here, with the music timing well with the additional shots of violence, particularly the shot where Batty removes his thumbs from Tyrell's eyes. The scene where Pris attacks Deckard now has the nose-pulling reinstated, but bafflingly now excludes the third blow, instead cutting straight from the second blow to the nose-pulling, and in doing so causes some really weird stuff to happen with the sound mix, and the score fades out abruptly to accommodate the extra footage (The workprint had temp music for this reel, so it stands to reason the US cut of the scene probably ended up being the one the score was matched to). Deckard also shoots Pris three times instead of two, though no new wound seems to appear on Pris' body after the additional gunshot. When Batty attempts to drive a nail through his hand, only here do you actually see it pierce through the back of his hand, along with his ensuing reaction. There are awkwardly no sound effects when the nail pierces through, though. The Final Cut incorporates the violence of the International Cut, but slightly alleviates some of the weirdness with the sound by adding a sound as the nail pierces Batty's hand.