You can probably guess my age if I tell you that I pretty much grew up with cyberpunk, having gotten started reading SF with late New Wave SF writers like Roger Zelazny, Michael Moorcock and Philip K Dick (pay particular attention to that last one) in time to pick up Bruce Sterling and Rudy Rucker. (Which is not to say that I didn’t read other SF, but as far as timing goes, cyberpunk’s growth is contemporaneous with me growing into a person: I read Neuromancer when it was new.

Which makes it all the more galling to admit that I only just watched Blade Runner, forty-some years late, and then mainly because it appeared on Netflix. I could tell you that in 1982, I was too little to watch it, and it would be true: I was only eleven. But I can’t deny that I’m late to this particular piece of nerd homework. I won’t even claim to have read the book it’s based on: I’m mostly familiar with Dick’s short stories.

The bits that people celebrate are all still there. The music (when I paid attention to it) was emblematic: there’s a discordant violin sting that I’ve always associated with SFnal television and cyberpunk futures, which I imagine originated here. Rutger Hauer's commanding screen presence works in his favour even when the lines don’t. The “like tears in rain” speech made my hair stand on end. And it’s clear that Blade Runner’s visuals and mise en scene have influenced much of the shows, movies, comics and games that I’ve consumed over the years.

Without the lacquer of nostagia, however, some things jar. The love scene between Deckard and Rachael seems violent, almost rape-y. I can’t be sure if it’s intentional - is she submissive because she’s a Replicant (spoiler!) or is he so aggressive because he knows she’s not human. It’s an uncomfortable scene to watch.

Even more uncomfortable is the use of “Asian” as a shorthand way to signal that the future Ridley Scott is picturing is different. It looks like part of Asia - and he populates it with Asians, too: James Hong (who, when he starred in the film, was the same age as I am now) as the purveyor of eyes, the noodle stand guy, extras and people in the streets. The crowded streets and the neon signs are evocative of Japan and Hong Kong. Yet the major characters, even the inhuman ones, well, they’re all … not Asian.

(Blade Runner premiered only four years after Edward Said's Orientalism was published.)

Unfortunately, these signifiers carry less weight if you’re actually Asian. Claustrophobic? Dystopian? I live like that all the time, right in the heart of Asia. I watched the film and immediately spotted echoes of Bangkok soi and lnight markets in Malaysia. When you live in one of the most densely-populated cities in the world (which also happens to be a country!), smack in the heart of Southeast Asia the alienness of Blade Runner’s urbanscape is considerably blunted.

It’s like home. Only with less neon.

This doesn’t make it a bad film. But the phenomena of watching it reminds me that it was created, and designed to be watched, in a particular time and place, for a particular audience - and when that particular conjunction doesn't happen, some of the magic disappears.