“I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears…in…rain. Time to die.”
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My head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of
universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I
reach my hands and play with pebbles of
destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs
reading “Keep Off.”
My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive
in the universe.
Gerard Van der Leun
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Sad day.
I’ll see your Blade Runner, and raise you one: The Mill and the Cross.
https://youtu.be/8EyqGK2blDw
May he rest in peace.
Rest in Peace.
The irony is that those words, and that performance will live on like a diamond glittering in the sun.
We give an of course nod to the satisfying power of your testimonial to those you love and have loved, Gerard, those who have not died . . . period, but who have died . . . comma, and who await your eventual arrival in their midst, above and beyond. Thank you for sharing them with us.
I have read elsewhere that Hauer ad-libbed those lines at that moment; they were not in the screenplay.
OK, here is how Hauer changed his closing lines.
That said, I think an equally compelling role of his was as the Soviet Army officer Alexander ‘Sasha’ Pechersky in Escape From Sobibor, the true story of the only Nazi concentration/death camp to have a mass escape. The Youtube trailer is here.
The movie is on Amazon Prime, but is also online at Daily Motion in excellent quality.
I was always impressed that at the very end, with the clock rapidly winding down to zero but time and strength enough still left, Hauer’s character could still easily have taken Deckard with him, but let him live. A fine piece of writing indeed.
One of the greatest scenes ever filmed. In one of the greatest movies.
Our SciFi fan club (NESFA) all went to see that film together. When Rutger finished those lines, my wife wept.
My brother was in the film Past Midnight with Rutger Hauer. During filming at night, in the Northwest, my brother had to lie on the hood of a car in the background of the scene. There were so many takes that he started to shiver uncontrollably. Rutger Hauer gave him his wetsuit to wear under his costume.