50 Greatest Movie Scenes Ever

8. Tears In The Rain - Blade Runner

Blade Runner Roy Batty
Warner Bros.

Much like those tears, our very perception of humanity is washed away as Roy Batty extends his hand to save the life of the man, Rick Deckard, who considers his a defective abomination to terminate as administrative duty.

A cloudburst of rain falls over the hyper-industrialised techno landscape. The otherworldly, futuristic synthesisers so alien in their menace recede into the mix, replaced by tinkling piano classical in composition. Rutger Hauer, mirroring the autonomy of his replicant character, delivers _that_ improvised, iconic spiel aching in its beauty.

Sound; vision; the high watermark of acting performance: humanity supplants the artificial in something so moving it makes us question everything. Roy Batty redeems himself from eye-gouging horror to something more human than human, his soul visible behind the ice-cold blue eyes that so perfectly cast him as a replicant. Batty in this moment is every poor creature you have ever judged, and this scene, in its framing of another world and portrayal of emotional complexity, is the conclusive distillation of cinema’s magic.

“Time to die,” Batty says, pointedly. He does not use the “retire” euphemism, because that’s what it is, ultimately; a verbal means of obscuring the dark heart of the creator refused, poignantly, by the creation.

[Michael Sidgwick]

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Articles published under the WhatCulture name denote collective efforts of a number of our writers, both past and present.

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WhatCulture's former COO, veteran writer and editor.

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WhatCulture's Head of Gaming.

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Josh has over 11 years of experience as a published writer, having worked nine of those years as a full-time content producer at WhatCulture. In that period he has created hundreds of articles, videos and podcast episodes for multiple WhatCulture channels, specialising in gaming, horror and film & TV. He now primarily works as a senior content producer and presenter on WhatCulture Gaming where he co-hosts the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, a top 3 UK most listened to gaming podcast that he co-created in 2018. Over the years he has reviewed several high-profile gaming releases, covered industry events with on-site reporting, opined on breaking news, and even kicked off his interviewing career by chatting to childhood hero, Tommy Wiseau.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.

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NCTJ-qualified journalist. Most definitely not a racing driver. Drink too much tea; eat too much peanut butter; watch too much TV. Sadly only the latter paying off so far. A mix of wise-old man in a young man's body with a child-like wonder about him and a great otherworldly sensibility.

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Michael Sidgwick (Creative Writing BA Hons) is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over a decade of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential UK institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!

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Horror film junkie, burrito connoisseur, and serial cat stroker. WhatCulture's least favourite ginger.