Great premise reduced to a pretty good action flick. 7/10

Rating: 8/10 (11 December 1999)

When I first saw Total Recall, only a bit over a year ago, I thought it was a fun action flick and nothing more. I remember being a bit disappointed at it. The scene where Edgecomb enters Quaid's hotel room and tells him that he is trapped in his own mind made me think how much better the film could have been if the writers had tried to make the audience think that maybe the whole movie (after Quaid visits Rekall) was just an accident in the memory implant.
Well, after watching the film twice in one week, I have discovered some things. The writers did try to make the film ambiguous. There are two huge clues to this fact right before Quaid is knocked out in the Rekall lab: 1. the picture on the screen is obviously Melina. 2. One of the technicians says, right before Quaid falls asleep: "Blue skies on Mars. That's new." (the second chapter to the end of the DVD is titled "Blue Skies on Mars).
So there we are. The story is ambiguous. Or is it? Very few people have even noticed this. I'm sure there are plenty of fans of the film who would violently argue that most of the film takes place in Quaid's head. These people should take the next step. There are huge problems with the last two acts of the film if it is just a dream. The biggest problem, the one which makes the whole dream theory fall utterly apart, is that at least a third of the scenes after Quaid is sedated take place without him on screen. One cannot dream without being present at the events which are unfolding.
I also think the writers were confused about the whole backstory. Hauser, is he supposed to be a good guy or a bad guy? Most people will pick up that we're supposed to think he is a good guy at the beginning, then near the end of the film he is revealed to have been involved in the whole plot against Kuato. It seemed like a really good plot twist the first time I saw it, and it felt like a kick in the stomach. The last time I watched it though, there is an interesting scene where Richter and Cohegan talk. Cohegan seems very frightened that Quaid might reveal the secrets he has found. He then tells Richter that he has a plan to capture him, and says, "I have a plan, if you're willing to play along." The plan he is talking about has to be the creation of Hauser as a bad guy who was only turned to Quaid so he could infiltrate the mutant rebellion. We can also see that Hauser was a rebel sympathizer earlier when Richter complains to his companions (not to Quaid), "We should have killed Quaid on Mars." Why would he say this unless Hauser had actually been an enemy before? If one thinks this back story out, it makes no sense whatsoever (notice that Benny infiltrated the mutant headquarters without any complex plot, thus they didn't really need Hauser to get to Kuato). Cohegan could have easily created a video with a fake Hauser (just as Quaid appeared as a fake fat woman). He could have easily implanted a fake memory in Quaid to make him believe that he had always been Hauser. The writers must have been confusing each other, though, because it seems that near the end they completely forgot that Hauser's evil persona was false. Cohegan persists in saying that he wants the old Hauser back. This makes no sense with what has come before.
The consensus: great premise that failed because of the screenwriters. It turns out to be just a fun action movie. The only thing the film did completely right: the Tri-Breasted Hooker and the Midget Hooker. I think they should get their own television series.