¨The past is a construct of the mind. It blinds
us. It fools us into believing it. But the heart wants to live in the present.
Look there. You'll find your answer.¨
This new version of Total Recall is better than
the original, but that`s not saying much considering I wasn`t very fond of that
one either. This remake shares sort of the same problems that the original had
considering there is a whole lot of action going around, but hardly any time
for character development. The entire movie feels like one big chase scene and
by the end instead of feeling the climax you are wishing it would end already.
The movie isn`t that long, but it feels like it. What I liked better about this
film was the look of it. The dark futuristic vision of the world was engaging
and some of my favorite scenes involved this imagery and brilliant futuristic
designs. This movie has a much better look and it was also a plus that it took
place entirely on Earth instead of Mars like in the original. I also think
Colin Farrell is a much better actor than Arnold, but when it comes to action
scenes Arnold was the best and in this film Farrell doesn’t have much to work
with besides running around from one action scene to another. The action scenes
have gotten repetitive and there isn’t anything unique about them in this movie
either; director Len Wiseman could have come up with a better plot to engage
the audience and not focus as much as he did with the action scenes. The
setting was the highlight of the movie for me and I enjoyed some of the devices
they imagined in this futuristic world but that was about it. Wiseman, who is
better known for directing the Underworld franchise, also hired Kate Beckinsale
to play the role Sharon Stone did in the original. I had no problem with the
casting, which for me was good, but I wished the characters were given more
meat.
Sometime in the future only two countries
exist: The United Federation of Britain and the Colony. It is a dark time where
most people live in poverty in the Colony and have to travel across the world
to Britain to work. There is very few habitable space for the people as a
Chemical warfare has destroyed most of the planet. Cohaagen (Bryan Cranston) is
the Chancellor of UFB who is dealing with a rebellious group from the Colony
under the leadership of Matthias (Bill Nighy). Times are unstable and the
future doesn’t look bright for the residents of Earth. Douglas Quaid (Colin
Farrell) seems to be living a normal life as a factory worker with a beautiful
wife named Lori (Kate Beckinsale), but he feels like escaping from the routine
of work and decides to pay a visit to Rekall, a company that specializes in
implanting brain memories. At Rekall he asks for an escape from his everyday life
and he chooses the option of becoming a spy. Before they implant the memory something
goes wrong and Quaid realizes that he is not who he thinks he is. He has
special abilities and even his wife seems to turn against him. Quaid suffers an
identity crisis and begins picking up clues about his past which involve him
working as a spy for the resistance movement. He immediately begins to be chased
by Lori and Cohaagen`s people and meets Melina (Jessica Biel) who claims to
know him from the past, but with another name. Quaid will have to try to discover
whether what he`s experiencing is real or if it`s just a fantasy implanted on
him from Rekall.
The main idea is very similar to the original
film, except for the fact that the resistance movement is in Earth and not in
Mars, although it is a very different planet by now. Colin Farrell plays the
same role Arnold did, Kate plays Stone`s role although Kate gets much more
screen time as she`s also the main persecutor as well, and Biel plays the role
of the heroin who helps unlock Quaid`s past. This film has a better cast in my
opinion, but the plot is equally as poor developed. At least in the original
version we had some funny one liners (what Arnold did best), but here the film
is much darker and serious. I enjoyed this version a little more, but I still didn’t
enjoy it very much. Maybe if the final action scene were a little shorter I
could`ve enjoyed it a little more. Total Recall shouldn’t of been remade it, it
just isn’t that remarkable of a film in my opinion.
