Philip K. Dick adaptations ranked

Nerve recently asked me to rank and briefly review all of the Philip K. Dick movie adaptations to date. The results are here. I deliberately, but truthfully, went against the conventional wisdom on Blade Runner, which I never thought quite lived up to the hype, at least in terms of narrative and character. Which isn't to say I dislike it-- not at all, in fact-- but I am definitely not inclined to knee-jerk it into the #1 slot. And yeah, I missed Barjo, the French adaptation of Confessions of a Crap Artist, which has yet to be released on DVD, and has been out of print on VHS for, oh, 20 years or so. I would, however, like to give an honorable mention to the oft-overlooked TV series Total Recall 2070, which is far better than you'd expect from a canceled-after-on-season Canadian-produced SF show of the late '90s. 

You will also note a capsule review of Adjustment Bureau in that list. Where is the full review, you ask? It is, after all, an SF film with God as the hero's main antagonist. Short answer: it's coming, soon. In the meantime, there are two very thoughtful reviews of the film worth reading. For Locus, Gary Westfahl details the extent to which Dick's story "Adjustment Team" went out the window in this adaptation, calling into question the very nature of adaptation. Regardless of your opinion on the film, it's a great essay. And for Religion Dispatches, Jay Michaelson (though much more kindly disposed to the film than Westfahl) finds fault with the way it frames, and solves, the question of free will vs. divine providence. Your homework, reader, is to take a look at those two essays; my review (hopefully up in a day or two) will touch on a few of the same points.