Sony Pictures Releasing
The debate on whether some films should get remade is a lot harder than you think when you consider some of the films that have dared to go back to sacred cinematic ground and ended up doing a better job. Plenty of sci-fi remakes have been better than the original movie they followed, but these are few and far between. One such entry that failed to hit the spot, for example, was the 2012 remake of “Total Recall.”
Originally adapted from the Philip K. Dick story, “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” (which made some startling technological predictions), Paul Verhoeven first brought the story to life in 1990 with the help of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Remaining one of the Austrian Oak’s most beloved films, it was jam-packed with the kind of over-the-top and highly enjoyable action that Verhoeven would become known for. More than two decades later, director Len Wiseman took a smart approach and aimed for a very different tone than what fans were used to.
He tried to deliver a much more serious story than the one you’d been fed for so long, and even made the daring decision to remove Mars from the story. That kind of daring creative choice could’ve worked, especially with a cast that included Colin Farrell, Bryan Cranston, Jessica Biel, and Kate Beckinsale. Unfortunately, the film didn’t gain quite the same momentum as its predecessor and got a firm thumbs-down from both critics and audiences alike.
Total Recall from 2012 was a forgettable remake
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Playing things a lot straighter than Schwarzenegger’s version of easy one-liners and three, well, you remember… the 2012 version, was lacking in any kind of character and felt like far more interesting sci-fi movies of that time. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian said that the movie “Recalls Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner and Christopher Nolan’s Inception, without, sadly being quite as distinctive as either.”
Dan Stewart (via Rotten Tomatoes) felt the film committed the cardinal sin of so many other ventures like this, calling it “Just another dumb, needless remake to add to the pile.” Sadly, as critics turned their nose up at Wiseman’s woeful attempt at taking on a classic, so too did the general audience. With a $125 million budget, the film earned a disappointing $198 million. To add further insult to injury, Jessica Biel got a Razzie nomination that year for Worst Supporting Actress.
She thankfully lost to Rihanna, who appeared in “Battleship,” a movie with even less reason to exist, given that it was based on a board game. Even with all that, though, there was one critic of the film that perhaps stung the project more than most, mainly because he’d done such a brilliant job of handling the first film way back when: the original director of the 1990s “Total Recall,” Paul Verhoeven.
Paul Verhoeven said the 2012 Total Recall was not good
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If there’s anyone who’s allowed to pass a harsher judgment on a remake, it’s the director of the film it’s taking from. Paul Verhoeven was on board with Wiseman’s take as a producer, chimed in with his thoughts on the updated version, and saw why it didn’t deliver like the 1990 version. The winning ingredient for his take, it seems, was the action movie icon at the center of it all.
“Arnold being [in the original ‘Total Recall’] made the movie a little light, and I think that’s very important for these Philip Dick stories,” Verhoeven told MovieLine. “I think if it would have been done in a straight way, I’m not so sure that it would have worked — at least, not at that time. And recently [in the ‘Total Recall’ remake], it did not. I get to say that because the producer of the new one said that [the original] was cheesy or something. And Colin Farrell called it in an interview ‘kitschy.’ So I dare to say that his version was not good.”
His argument might hold some truth, but some Dick adaptations have aimed for the same kind of serious tone as Wiseman’s “Total Recall” and delivered. Movies like “Blade Runner” and “Minority Report” had a lot more to say and did a great job of saying it. The problem with the 2012 “Total Recall” is that it had all been heard before, and it just turned out to be a far more entertaining version because of it.
