Blade Runner Day 13, Leon Kowalski

Poor Leon. Yeah, he's a homicidal murderer. But he loves his girl, Zhora. He loves his false memories and his pictures. And above all he loves his mom(he shoots Holden for even mentioning her in the first scene). And on top of all that he gets capped by a replicant. Not a Blade Runner replicant, another replicant on the run.

He was a great actor. He was also in another of my favorite movies, Flesh And Blood. Until recently that was the most accurate medieval movie. It also starred Rutger Haur(and Jennifer Jason Leigh who was super hot in it, and after Rutger debauched the hell out of her they made the Hitcher where he tears her apart). Brion James, the actor who portrayed Leon was also in another great science fiction movie, The Fifth Element. He also had a small role in Enemy Mine(which I like no matter what you think). Unfortunately he died of a heart attack in 1999. He was pretty great.

I drew this on purple paper. The color mainly shows through in his eyes. The rest has been painted over to different degrees with watercolor(I used almost every color in there). I painted the sky blue, which in the scan looks more like the scene in the movie, because it is supposed to be blue smoke. I used acrylic blue ink and acrylic white over water color white. And I used black ink for all the black parts. I used acrylic brown ink for the hair.

This is the moment after Deckard has shot Zhora, when you get a quick glimpse that Leon witnessed it. He is totally shocked yet completely filled with rage. After a few scenes he attacks Deckard.

I keep the television on for some background noise(I use music when I write for the mood). All day they've been showing the commercial for the new Blade Runner DVD. So I'm drawing Leon and thinking about the movie when all of a sudden I think I'm hallucinating his voice but it is actually his voice in the commercial saying "Time To Die". A phrase repeated by Roy Batty later on although in a completely different way.

Adrian