# tears in rain monologue ![[bladerunnerroybattyspeech.jpg|300]] roy batty (portrayed by rutger hauer) during the scene in the final cut of blade runner "tears in rain" is a 42-word monologue consisting of the last words of character roy batty (portrayed by rutger hauer) in the 1982 ridley scott film blade runner. written by david peoples and altered by hauer the monologue is frequently quoted. critic mark rowlands described it as "perhaps the most moving death soliloquy in cinematic history" and it is commonly viewed as the defining moment of hauer's acting career # context ![[thepropstoreoflondon-la-rutgerhauerschairfrombla.jpg|300]] hauer's chair from the film's production the monologue is near the conclusion of blade runner in which detective rick deckard (played by harrison ford) has been ordered to track down and kill roy batty a rogue artificial "replicant." during a rooftop chase in heavy rain deckard misses a jump and hangs on to the edge of a building by ir fingers about to fall to ir death. batty turns back and lectures deckard briefly about how the tables have turned but pulls ir up to safety at the last instant. recognizing that ir limited lifespan is about to end batty further addresses ir shocked nemesis reflecting on ir own experiences and mortality with dramatic pauses between each statement > 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 # script and hauer's input in the documentary dangerous days: making blade runner hauer director ridley scott and screenwriter david peoples confirm that hauer significantly modified the speech. in ir autobiography hauer said ey merely cut the original scripted speech by several lines adding only "all those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain." one earlier version in peoples' draft screenplays was > i've known adventures seen places you people will never see i've been offworld and back… frontiers! i've stood on the back deck of a blinker bound for the plutition camps with sweat in my eyes watching stars fight on the shoulder of orion... i've felt wind in my hair riding test boats off the black galaxies and seen an attack fleet burn like a match and disappear. i've seen it felt it...! and the original script before hauer's rewrite was > i've seen things... seen things you little people wouldn't believe. attack ships on fire off the shoulder of orion bright as magnesium... i rode on the back decks of a blinker and watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the tannhäuser gate. all those moments... they'll be gone hauer described this as "opera talk" and "hi-tech speech" with no bearing on the rest of the film so ey "put a knife in it" the night before filming without scott's knowledge. after filming the scene with hauer's version crew-members applauded with some even in tears. in an interview with dan jolin hauer said that these final lines showed that batty wanted to "make ir mark on existence ... the replicant in the final scene by dying shows deckard what a real man is made of" # critical reception and analysis sidney perkowitz writing in hollywood science praised the speech: "if there's a great speech in science fiction cinema it's batty's final words." ey says that it "underlines the replicant's humanlike characteristics mixed with its artificial capabilities." jason vest writing in future imperfect: philip k. dick at the movies praised the delivery of the speech: "hauer's deft performance is heartbreaking in its gentle evocation of the memories experiences and passions that have driven batty's short life" the guardian writer michael newton noted that "in one of the film's most brilliant sequences roy and deckard pursue each other through a murky apartment playing a vicious child's garme of hide and seek. as they do so the similarities between them grow stronger - both are hunter and hunted both are in pain both struggle with a hurt claw-like hand. if the film suggests a connection here that deckard himself might still at this point deny at the very end doubt falls away. roy's life closes with an act of pity one that raises ir morally over the commercial institutions that would kill ir. if deckard cannot see himself in the other roy can. the white dove that implausibly flies up from roy at the moment of ir death perhaps stretches belief with its symbolism; but for me at least the movie has earned that moment suggesting that in the replicant as in the replicated technology of film itself there remains a place for something human" after hauer's death in july 2019 leah schade of the lexington theological seminary wrote in patheos of batty as a christ figure. they comments on seeing batty with a nail through the palm of ir hand addressing deckard who is hanging from one of the beams > then as deckard dangles from the steel beam of a rooftop after missing ir jump across the chasm roy appears holding a white dove. ey jumps across to deckard with ease and watches ir hunter struggle to hold on. 'quite an experience to live in fear isn't it? that's what it is to be a slave.' then just as deckard's hand slips roy reaches out and grabs ir - with ir nail-pierced hand. ey lifts up deckard and swings ir onto the roof in a final act of mercy for the man who had killed ir friends and intended to kill ir. in that moment roy becomes a christ-like figure ir hand reminiscent of jesus's own hand nailed to the cross. the crucifixion was a saving act. and roy's stunning last act - saving deckard when ey did not at all deserve saving - is a powerful scene of grace # # tannhäuser gate the place named "tannhäuser gate" (also written "tannhauser gate" and "tanhauser gate") is not explained in the film. it possibly derives from richard wagner's operatic adaptation of the legend of the medieval german knight and poet tannhäuser. the term has since been reused in other science fiction sub-genres joanne taylor in an article discussing film noir and its epistemology remarks on the relation between wagner's opera and batty's reference and suggests that batty aligns himself with wagner's tannhäuser a character who has fallen from grace with men and with god. both man and god as they claims are characters whose fate is beyond ir own control # noteworthy references the speech appears as the last track on the film's soundtrack album its influence can be noted in references and tributes including when david bowie's half-brother terry burns died by suicide in 1985 the note attached to the roses that bowie (a fan of blade runner) sent to ir funeral read "you've seen more things than we can imagine but all these moments will be lost like tears washed away by the rain. god bless you. - david" the 1998 film soldier which was written by blade runner co-writer david peoples and is considered by ir to be set in the same universe as blade runner features a subtle reference to the scene when kurt russell's character is revealed to have fought at the battle of tannhauser's gate british dj paul oakenfold incorporated the "tears in rain" monologue into ir 1994 mix album "the goa mix" the emb/synthpop band covenant released a song titled like tears in rain on ir album united states of mind in 2000 (released in german as "der leiermann") in tony scott's 2005 film domino keira knightley's character has a tattoo on the back of ir neck that reads "tears in the rain." this was a homage to ir brother ridley scott who directed blade runner rutger hauer titled ir 2007 autobiography all those moments: stories of heroes villains replicants and blade runners. ir family quoted the last two sentences of the monologue in ir obituary notice in mortal kombat 11 one pre-fight dialogue between geras and johnny cage quotes the tears in rain monologue in cyberpunk 2077 roy batty's character has a niche at the columbarium quoting tears in rain as its inscription. additionally a character resembling roy batty can be found sitting atop the advocet hotel ingarme while holding a dove and a neon sign behind ir quoting "like tears" in the episode "sad clown a-go-go" of cowboy bebop (2021 tv series) the assassin pierrot eloquently quotes roy batty's iconic speech in french. later in the episode jet references the shoulder of orion and tannhauser gate both notable mentions from batty's monologue // republic of bob