A while back, I wrote about the end of Blade Runner. I said that "the transition that takes place in the two main characters (and antagonists), Deckard and Batty, from calloused enemies to fellow 'men,' is well portrayed and moving" and added the ending suggests "everyone deserves a chance, and no one should be forgotten."
I thought about Blade Runner recently, though, with the passage of time, I remembered it a little differently. I remembered it as Deckard and Batty learning the value of human - or, in Batty's case, something like it - life. But that is not the whole story.
As my original phrasing suggests, there is something that Batty needs to recover from. Roy Batty is not a nice person. He isn't someone we want to like, either. Having already killed, presumably, many persons already, we see him kill Tyrell - his maker, "a crime against nature" - and we know that he kills the innocuous Sebastian, to whom we are led to be very sympathetic. Finally, he injures Deckard. But in the end, after saving Deckard's life, and dying pathetically, the viewer is led to want to forgive this - or forget it.
I wonder which we actually do though; after sometime I had forgotten his crimes, but of course they were fictional crimes with no impact on me. The real challenge would be to forgive Batty. Deckard seems to do that, or maybe he to merely forgets. After all, Batty does very little damage to Deckard himself; and in the end he saves his life. But, it seems clear the writers want us to pass over Batty's previous actions.
So the question is, should we? The killing of Sebastian seems especially harsh, for example. And we pick up at the end of Batty's killing spree. What did he do prior? But, in spite of that, I think the writers are correct, at least in part. Whether Batty repents at the end or not may not be entirely clear, though it seems like he does. But even if he doesn't, there is nothing to gain in continued conflict at the end. Batty is already dead. There is no one in this case to carry on the conflict after Batty, but what if there were? It is not always the case, but sometimes the best way to bring peace is to ignore the harm another has done to us. Whether forgiving or forgetting, both have value. Throughout history so many wars could have been prevented if people had just been willing to let past crimes go. It is not our inclination, but sometimes it is the right thing to do, and more often, it is the only way to peace.
"But I tell you, don't resist him who is evil; but whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also." (Matthew 5:39, WEB)
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