While Blade Runner 2049 has been shrouded in mystery, most of its details gleaned from a few prerelease short films and some dense, apocalyptic trailers, one chestnut from the set has become a sort of legend of its production, which is that of Harrison Ford punching Ryan Gosling in the face. There’s something wonderful about the grouchy, avuncular Ford walloping the kind-eyed younger actor square in his moneymaker, an image that has only been burnished by its telling after the fact. The accidental punch came in the middle of a fight scene, and when people afterward ran to Gosling with ice for his face, Ford instead used the ice for his fist. Later, he told GQ that “Gosling’s face was where it should not have been,” before offering some tepid praise: “He’s a fucking Mouseketeer—he’s been doing this since he was 6 years old or something. He knows what he’s doing.”
Now making the talk-show rounds, Ford still cannot stop owning the poor guy, stopping by Graham Norton to humiliate him by forgetting his name repeatedly. And while it’s clearly a bit, you get the feeling that this shit never let up on set, like Ford was constantly taking Gosling’s chair and making him pick up the tab and mistaking him for a gaffer. This is the sort of shit you get away with when you’re Harrison Ford.
Anyway, it all apparently worked out fine, at least as far as the movie’s concerned. You can read our full review of it here.