It's a shame the second half of the movie had all that 'elevator through the center of the planet' nonsense. It started out really fun.
this post was submitted on 10 Jul 2023
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The original Total Recall (1990) is definitely a classic but this movie goes in a different direction entirely. No one goes to Mars in this version. There's still the main plot of "is he really a special agent or was it an implanted memory" but otherwise there's very little overlap between the two.
I personally enjoyed this remake, but mostly because the first half is straight-up cyberpunk. The rich live in Europe while the poor live in Australia and have to commute via an elevator that goes through the middle of the planet. So the first half of the movie has great high-tech low-life visuals but then by the second half of the movie it's just a straight-up action flick where most of the remaining runtime is spent on that elevator. So it's not that the movie is "bad" in my opinion but it does turn into a mindless action movie.
So a movie based on a book, that decided to completely ignore the actual book and just borrows a few aspects of it? No thanks. Although it sounds that the first half was entertaining in it's own way. Maybe it makes for a fine popcorn movie for people who don't actually know what the plot is 'supposed' to be.
I mean, that's a totally fair take. It definitely is an unnecessary remake that doesn't add anything to the original. And it is just a popcorn action movie (especially the second half).
But I'd argue a movie is still capable of being good even if it ignores most of its source material. Blade Runner would be a perfect example of this. It has very little to do with Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. And it has nothing to do with the novel named Blade Runner.
Honestly, I think Philip K. Dick's books are the best candidates for making loose interpretations of the source material. He had brilliant ideas and settings but I don't think he was very good at coming up with a story within those settings. I guess that's just my personal opinion though. I've read various PKD books but I haven't read all the original stories that were later turned into movies. I haven't read Paycheck or Minority Report, for example. So maybe my opinion is tainted by the books I did read.
I see, thanks. I'll have to keep an eye out for whenever it cycles back around onto one of the streaming services I subscribe to.