|
In
the future, a war has left Earth divided into the United Federation of
Britain
and 'The Colony' (formerly Australia). Both the UFB and the Colony are
overpopulated and people travel between the areas through an elevator
called
'The Fall', which transports through the core of the Earth. Douglas
Quaid
(Colin Farrell) is a factory worker who is having nightmares and finds
little
comfort from his wife Lori (Kate Beckinsale). He decides to visit a
company
called Rekall, where false adventures and memories can be implanted
into his
brain. Yet when Rekall scans Quaid to see if he is holding any secrets,
he is
accused of being a spy. Quaid manages to escape, but only after killing
several
cops. Lori turns out not to be his real wife but an agent for the UFB
who is
monitoring him. Escaping from her, Quaid is told that his name is
Hauser
and that he
has a code that could stop the evil Chancellor Vilos
Cohaagen (Bryan Cranston) but it must be shown to the resistance leader
Matthais
(Bill Nighy) first. Aiding him in finding Matthais is Melina (Jessica
Biel), a woman
from his dreams. Meanwhile, Cohaagen is blaming a terrorist attack on
rebel
fighters so that he has an excuse to use his army of robots to wipe out
people
on 'The Colony'.
Total
Recall is excruciatingly dull and
visually derivative, more intent on being a video game instead of a
film, but
unlikely to have the faintest impact on the most seasoned gamer. It is
also an
unnecessary remake of the 1990 Arnold Schwarznegger film, and another
loose and
problematic adaptation of Philip K. Dick's short story 'We Can Remember
it For
You Wholesale' (1966). The original film, which I rewatched recently,
had the
framework of a Schwarznegger vehicle, combining humour, ultra violence
and
technology. But the director Paul Verhoeven was also skilful in the way
that he
planted ideas in the audience's head about what is real and imaginary.
What was
also interesting about the original was that it predated the golden age
of
video games, but still played like an advanced version of Donkey Kong
at times.
Now that Total Recall is over twenty
years old it has been succeeded by more lavish films about memory and
dreams,
like The Matrix (1999) and Inception
(2010). On the back of the
success of Christopher Nolan's film, someone thought it would be a good
idea to
remake Total Recall for the Call of Duty generation.
That job has been
given to director Len Wiseman, whose equally tedious Underworld
(2003) series is every bit a computer game, minus the
controller. Incidentally, he has a background in developing commercials
for
companies such as Sony and Activision. And the stylistic choices he has
made
for this film show how much he is willing to pander monotonously to the
video
game demographic.
Wiseman has stated that he wanted a more grounded
approach to
the film. The sterile look of the original is replaced by grittier,
dirtier
tones of a highly industrial and mechanical landscape. This
is fine until you realise that the film's iconography is simply
derivative of
much better games and movies. The flying cars and cityscapes owe all
too much
to Blade Runner (1982) and Minority Report
(2002), while the
frequent long shots seem employed only to show off the design, echoing
the likes
of open world games such as Grand Theft
Auto. The amount of detail in the city feels wasted since it holds
no
greater stylistic meaning. Notably, there's no Mars and only a single
mutant in
this supposedly grounded take too. Instead, there are robots to be
destroyed
because they're bloodless targets (no one bleeds in movies like this
anymore do
they?) and it allows the film to steal from the recent Star
Wars prequels. But why is there such a disjunction between
games and films when they look to imitate each other? Heated debate
surrounds
whether games can be art and whether
they are becoming as sophisticated a medium as films themselves. The
technology
surrounding games continues to grow and gamers are also now encouraged
to make
moral choices that can shape the outcome of a narrative. However, part
of the
reason why Hollywood has continually failed to bridge films and games
together,
through some awful adaptations, is because games are a medium defined
by interaction. Games place a higher
emphasis on action rather than narrative
because the player has physical input,
rather than merely watching the story unfold, like a film. By their
nature, video
games are rarely allowed the time and space to develop narratives of
thematic
sophistication. They are fun and often visually imaginative but not
art. The
two mediums are simply divorced by their purpose and design, as much as
their
audience.
Total Recall
epitomises this problematic relationship. The intricate themes of
Dick's short
story, how we acquire knowledge and process information and the misuse
of
technology, are dissolved by the director's insistence on action and
designing
a video game that you can't actually play. The humourless cast, which
includes
Bill Nighy limited ridiculously to a single scene, are treated like
tokens of a
board game, moved from one set piece to another. The action sequences
they're
thrown into, which involve dodging flying cars, escaping from an
exploding lift
and jumping over rooftops, are long and boring to watch. Most
frustrating is
that there is less ambiguity here because I wasn't convinced that Quaid
was
dreaming this time. There's a scene in the original where a man in a
bowtie
provides scientific reasoning as to why Quaid is dreaming. It puts
doubt in
your mind. In this version, Quaid is told to shoot Melina and he'll
wake up. Anyone
who can believe that really is dreaming. Exit game.
|
