The movie opens up beautifully, and it really feels like Blade Runner with slow sweeping pictures of a high tech but barren land. The cinematography is breathtaking! It keeps on delivering very artful images, some with impressive CGI, some with in all honesty dodgy CGI (especially the smoke from some of the scenes).
As the story unfolds I was getting more and more sucked in to the movie. It didn't take long before understanding "K"s memories are implants and not his own experiences. But the thing that totally got me the most was my uncertainty of who was a replicant or human. And if the replicants were in fact more human than human. It seemed the replicants had souls more than humans, which made me think of the Ghost in the Shell anime.
Blade Runner 2049 took a long time to say what it wanted to say, and some parts were a little too long and the movie lost its pace here and there. But the amazing performances, especially from Mr Ford, more than made up for it.
However, the movie's biggest achievement was the story. It was extremely well written with almost surgical precision.
I did find two things that I didn't like so much, or perhaps felt was missing at least.
First of which was the music. It was futuristic and very beautiful but it lacked emotions.
Another thing I thought was missing was more city shots. In the original Blade Runner, Los Angeles was just as much a character as Deckard was. In BR2049, I didn't felt that way. And that somewhat degraded the movie slightly.
All in all, a worthy sequel with a fantastic story. Denis Villeneuve is master of telling deep, philosophical stories.
Money well spent.
