Building on Blade Runner

I somehow neglected to post this earlier: A Los Angeles Times article tells us that, inspired by Ridley Scott’s 1982 science-fiction masterpiece, a businessman hopes to giant animated billboards like those seen in the movie:

• Sonny Astani walked into a Westwood movie theater in 1985 and saw the film that changed his life: “Blade Runner,” the science-fiction tale that imagined a dystopian Los Angeles where jet-powered cars zoom past skyscrapers covered with enormous, cinematic advertisements. Decades later, the Iranian-born businessman is determined to bring some of those futuristic images to life. His plan? Attach an animated sign 14-stories tall on the 33-story condominium project he is building in downtown L.A. The proposed sign would loom 12 stories above the sidewalk at 9th and Figueroa streets, facing the 110 Freeway. And city planners say it would represent a first in the city’s residential architecture — a sheet of light-emitting screens spaced close enough to form a vast electronic image, yet far enough apart to allow occupants to look outside.

So, if Astani has his way, Los Angeles may really start to look like this:

As a fan of BLADE RUNNER, it ticles my fancy to think that a piece of it may become reality. On the other hand, it is not as if the futuristic Los Angeles in the movie was depicted as something toward which we should aspire. How would we feel if some entrepreneur announced his intention to implement a few innovations inspired by 1984?

REVIEW FLASHBACK: Blade Runner