"If I'm not me then who the hell am I?" As already mentioned, definitely one of Arnie's best.

Rating: 8/10 (21 September 2007)

Total Recall is set in the future where interplanetary space travel is a reality, on Earth lowly construction worker Douglas Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) has strange dreams involving Mars & decides to go to a company called Rekall who implant virtual memories of holidays in peoples minds. Doug ask's for a complete set of memories for a trip to Mars, the implant goes wrong & Doug has a violent reaction. The guy's at Rekall put him in a cab & send him away, then Doug's day goes from bad to worse when his friend from work tries to kill him, his wife (Sharon Stone) tries to kill him too & he learns that the evil ruler of Mars Vilos Cohaagen (Ronny Cox) has wiped his memory & dumped him on Earth. As Doug struggles to discover his own identity he is thrown into a war between Cohaagen & rebel terrorists on Mars as people try to kill him left, right & center, but which side is he working for & why...
Directed by Paul Verhoeven I'll get straight to the point & say that I think Total Recall is a brilliant sci-fi actioner & easily one of Schwarzenegger's best films. The script by Ronald Shusett, Dan O'Bannon & Gary Goldman was based on the short story 'We Can Remember it For You Wholesale' by famed sci-fi writer Philip K.Dick is a surprisingly intelligent & thoughtful sci-fi story with all the bangs, shoot-outs & violence associated with director Verhoeven & star Schwarzenegger which complement each other better than one might expect. The film moves along at a nice pace, it's never boring & the story is intricate & complex enough to keep you alert & concentrating, this is far from the by-the-numbers one man army action flick that Schwarzenegger is known for. The film manages to keep you guessing, it's well written enough to have several potential outcomes & it manages to make yourself doubt whether what's happening is real or just a complete dream. Of course this being an action flick there's plenty of it & Total Recall is also a very violent film, this is the type of 90's flick where it is necessary to use excessive force & gory violence at all times. The character's are interesting, the dialogue is good with some typical Schwarzenegger one liners like saying 'consider that a divorce' after shooting his wife in the head! I don't know what else to say really, Total Recall is just a great film with loads of violence, nudity, fights, memorable villains & a surprisingly good sci-fi plot that you need to see for yourself.
Apparently David Cronenberg was originally set to direct but eventual director Verhoeven does a fine job here, he is his usual uncompromising self as Total Recall is packed full of gore, mutant freak hookers, midget hookers, nudity & general excess. He doesn't know the meaning of the word subtle & that's just another reason why I love Total Recall so much. The special effects are very impressive, from expansive shots of the Martian landscape to huge reactors under the surface of Mars this looks good even now. The Jonnycab scenes are hilarious, the futuristic vision created here seems plausible & as such the film hasn't dated at all although if I was being picky why weren't the glass used for domes on Mars bullet proof & where were the security services as Quaid & Victor shoot at each other in the subway? What happened to the guy's behind the desk watching the X-ray machine? They had guns, where did they go? In the mid 80's the story which Total Recall was based upon was brought by Italian hack producer Dino de Laurentiis, he tried to make the film starring Patrick Swayze & directed by Bruce Beresford & sets were actually built in Australia but the shoot was cancelled when de Laurentiis' company went bankrupt & that's when Schwarzenegger stepped in & convinced the brass at Carolco to buy the script & let him star.
With a supposed budget of about $65,000,000 Total Recall looks the business, it's sets, special effects, production design, rousing music by Jerry Goldsmith are all top notch although Rob Bottin's special make-up effects are strangely average & don't bear close scrutiny. Shot in Mexico all of the cast & crew went down with food poisoning expect Schwarzenegger who had his food specially flown in from the US... The acting is pretty good, Schwarzenegger is OK, Sharon Stone looks nice while Ronny Cox & Michael Ironside play their bad guy roles with relish.
Total Recall is just a totally fantastic film, it's more than just an Arnie shoot-em-up, it has neat sci-fi ideas behind it, plenty of excess violence & is just a great film. Definitely recommended. Followed by the TV series Total Recall 2070 (1999) which ran for 22 episodes.