Haven't see the original Total Recall with Arnold Schwarzenegger because it, er, had Arnold Schwarzenegger in it but this remake, reboot or whatever you want to call it stars an actual actor, Colin Farrell.
I love the concept - you can get fake memories planted in you brain so essentially you can live another life for a bit. The only rule is you aren't allowed to choose a memory that has any roots in reality.
And that is where our hero has a problem because when he goes to recall and chooses to be a spy, it turns out he really was one and he just can't remember it. So suddenly he's being pursued by people who know who he really is.
Now there are plenty of plot holes and leaps of faith - a train through the centre of the earth for one and said train only takes something like 20 minutes to go from Australia to Britain. But leaving that to one side it is a good action flick.
Farrell, I am sure, giving depth and humanity to Douglas Quaid in a way Schwarzenegger could only dream of. I liked the futuristic vision, probably because it reminded me a little of Blade Runner and I liked the play with what is real and what isn't. I also liked the fact that it had strong female characters who were more than capable of kicking a bit of butt.
It was an enjoyable, not taxing couple of hours in the cinema and I am going to give it 59%. On IMDb is has 63% with a Metascore of 43% while on Rotten Tomatoes it got 29% from critics and 47% of site visitors gave it three and a half stars or higher.
I liked it too. So many references and one extremely odd moment, or so it seemed at the time. There is a scene where a lady of the night reveals her chest to Doug. This is in context and I think it overemphasised the point that this was a seedy area of the colony. However... was I the only one who went "what the shuddering chuff was the need for that?". The answer came to me when I got home. This was yet another SciFi reference and alludes to H2G2. Im still not convinced it was necessary in a 12A and would you really want a 10year old seeing this movie? or a 4 year old (yes I know one 4yr old that was taken to see The Amazing Spiderman :/).
Posted by: Simon Pudsey | 09/27/2012 at 10:18 PM