‘Total Recall’ a decent remake but not as good as original

When you’re living in a futuristic world where you can be anyone you want to be if you have the right connections, it becomes a scary world, especially if the life you have always lived…isn’t who you are.

That’s what happened to factory worker, Douglas Quaid (Colin Farrell), when he starts to relive the same dream over and over in the new hit remake Total Recall. This becomes even more real when he visits a company called Rekall, whose company implants fake memories of a life clients would have liked to have led. After Quaid chooses the spy package at Rekall, they system goes wrong and he finds himself on the run when he goes back to wife, Lori (Kate Beckinsale) who is secretly not his wife at all and is, in fact, trying to kill him instead. With help from Melina (Jessica Biel) the girl in his reoccurring dreams, Quaid discovers secrets about himself that are too good to tell.

As a movie buff, I saw this movie’s original about 200,000 times growing up and I have to say that although Farrell’s version was clean-cut, full of action with a great sense of interesting camera angles (that did not make e dizzy for once) and with amazing special effect, the movie was lacking.

The movie’s original, featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger as Quaid, Sharon Stone as Lori and Rachel Ticotin as Melina, revolved around the same idea except with the 1990 special effects. Compared to the original, Colin Farrell’s presentation of the movie was sensational because of the brilliant acting skills, special effects and his interpretation of the original.

The new plot revolves around the concept that Quaid is a secret spy for the police and has turned against them to fight for a rebellion, which is the same as the original. The difference is that, in the original, Schwarzenegger is a spy turned against everyone because he wants to help the rebellion stop the leader of the world, Vilos Cohaagen, who is sucking all of the air from the atmosphere and killing everyone who live in the slums.

The original included Schwarzenegger’s trademark action kick-ass routine compared to Farrell. Even though the blockbuster was fairly outdated, even with the high rush of special effects and CGI innovation that was there in 1990, it still delivered. This new version of the movie, swaps out Mars, mutants, and aliens, for a more traditional conflict featuring a post-apocalyptic Earth landscape, robots, and corrupt politicians.

Overall, the remake is a good movie but not as good as the original. Even with the high action-packed sequences, three-way love interests and semi-well done plot, the movie lacks the original twists and turns and falls flat in certain aspects.